The Great Terminus War
by mad0slayer
Summary: (Rewrite to fix earlier issues will start to post in new year)
1. Chapter 1-First Contact with Friends

**Disclaimer:** I do not own anything here it all belongs to mass effect

 **NOTE:** The codex is now separate from the story and will update it over time.

I also have a beta, thany you very much Whitetiger62512.

 **Foreword**

 **AN:** Hello, fellow reader! Thank you for showing interest in the story I am hoping you will enjoy it just to let you know

 **First:** This is my first story so any advice is welcome as I don't mind if ya bring up issues as long as it not unreasonable and is just pure bashing because my first time I am bound to make a lot of mistakes. We are all if you find a few odd quirks in my spelling it because of I South African

 **Second:** The Tech comes from (The Iron Heart of Man by Apollonir) and don't make an issue about it if you think it stupid.

 **Third:** This is Science Fiction so don't start rants or bashing if you know better.

 **Fourth:** The Timeline has changed by 100 odd years humanity is Colonizing much sooner than in the original timeline humanity also the cold war went on for much longer. changed instead of the first contact in 2157 it will be 2257.

 **Fifth:** The firearms do not look like anything from mass effect for humanity look at XM8 because that looks great.

 **Sixth:** I plan on having very gore and explicit issues all related to warfare and combat

 **Seventh:** humanity's location in the Galaxy has changed they are now stuck in the middle of the terminus and closer to the Asari boarders than the Turians and Batarian ones

 **Eight:** This is my first time so I'm a newbie!

 **Nine:** I own nothing related to this story not from halo. Star wars or 40k I just borrowed names from them because of there no way in hell I could think of some great names like they have.

 **What is this chapter about:** This will just be the timeline along with the weapons and vehicles used within the systems alliance

 **This story will have three arcs:** The first arc will focus on the first contact war along with the politics and introduction to the galaxy. The second will focus on the war with the terminus and the Alliance trying to secure there territory. The Third and final arc of this story will be more politically focused and events for the likely sequel I have planned such as the forming of the Commonwealth Federation

 **Timeline**

 **1970:** Soviet Union Parliament notice a lack in economic growth forces them to drop to 3% GDP put to defense programs whilst they sort the issue is fixed.

 **1975:** the Soviet Union enacts Perestroika to further increase the growth of there economy.

 **1995:** Soviet Union economy rivals America in terms of prosperity. The parliament boost defense programs spending to 10% whilst investing 30% in new technology forcing America to increase there own spending on research to keep pace.

 **2015:** Years of research pay off as a new space race begins with the promise of creating a base on Luna within ten years. The Soviet Union and America in a race to be better-prepared start massive investments in Third world countries. While America tries to improve the industrial and infrastructure of the African Countries. The Soviet Union Begins work on South American countries

 **2020:** A Superstructure the Space Elevator is designed by a German Engineer and scientist team is completed and sold to both world Super Powers. Construction Starts With Soviet Union space elevator in the North Pacific Ocean While America and NATO start there's in the North Atlantic Ocean

 **2025:** A Breakthrough in construction methods for materials by a scientist in how to make use of minimal materials for the best outcome while engineers learn it's uses. Two separate Luna Bases are established with solar power and hydroponics to support those who move in they are both inside two of the largest craters to avoid asteroid strikes.

 **2028:** Fusion Energy is successfully produced

 **2035:** Construction of the two space elevators are completed 3 days apart with the Soviet Union been slowed down by materials this causes a rise in tension between the two Countries. Engineers and scientist begin the design of new spacecraft vessels a joint research and design project to send a human to Mars. A satellite is launched to Mars to prepare for the mission

 **2037: Satellite** reaches Mars and begins it's information gathering two months later information is collected and shown to world governments about an energy reading it picks up in the Deseado Crater

 **2040:** The IT department in Europe decides to create a true AI programming starts. Luna now has a population of 12000 on earth forces all governments to enact a family size regulation law. Medicine is greatly improved upon solving many health issues it also has increased the human lifespan by another 60 mathematics and theories have developed with 3 been focused on them been wormholes, warp, and hyperspace.

 **2041:** The making of AI whilst not completed generates a large amount of attention leading to multiple groups been formed. Governments decide to ensure that AI is seen as people to avoid any possible issues. Riots ensue which is met with policing action. Construction of Voyager 1 begins with the strange energy reading been the focus of the mission.

 **2044:** MAC guns that have been built on to naval vessels for the last 20 years have been miniaturized enough to be built into LMG. Further research is done to improve on the weapon system.

 **2045:** Dumb AI created which is logic based earning them the name of Spock AI. This leads to a large number of Governments investing in the venture as well as purchasing them. This leads to the formation of Ibot industries. Smart AI is theorized to require a human brain a request for volunteers is sent out.

 **2048:** Voyager 1 begins it's journey to Mars. Ibot solves the issue of smart AI after the human brain has been fully mapped. A dumb AI is upgraded to a smart AI. This leads to the AI questioning what its name was the employees there give the AI the name Athena she then asks if she has a soul. The answer was "we do not know but in time we might but for us yes you do".Communication was done via speakers and microphone. Research into a mobile platform is commenced

 **2050:** Construction of four more space elevators are commenced and Earth Nations begin the construction of military spacecraft making use of Fusion Energy. Luna now has a population of 45000 people. Mining Spacecraft begin construction alongside military vessels. Colonies are planned for all other of Sol's celestial bodies.

 **2051:** Voyager 1 land on Mars and searches the surface for the anomaly. They find a door to a structure and do not enter because of unknowns samples are taking and a base set up for the next mission they begin there return trip to earth 2 months later. Mobile Platforms work well and emulate plenty of human movements. They last a few days they just require a better power source to improve from

 **2054:** Completion of the first space vessel frigates are completed with a Single Mac gun and four mac turrets. Voyager 2 is sent with smart AI and 150 personal to the alien structure to investigate

 **2055:** Voyager 2 arrives because of new engines within 9 months they begin there mission they spend 3 months exploring and securing all information related to the site. They bring all information back with them along with the spacecraft left at the alien structure. America and the Soviet Union start to focus on what this could mean for there future.

 **2060:** The Prothean data cache is used to improve upon a few of there technology but a lack of element zero sees to it that it is not used to avoid dependency of the element which could lead to stagnancy. The Language is translated 2 months later after it is discovered that all the information on the sight is mostly corrupt except for infantry and land vehicle kinetic barriers along with a message that stated that the Prothean empire which spanned the galaxy was exterminated by an unknown force from dark space. Governments around the world to meet and plan for possible war. Governments around the world decide to use the cold war issue to maintain a strong military presence and build up. Cold war ends unofficially.

 **2060-2085:** Humanity enters a colonization era for the sol system which leads to the majority of the sol system been colonized and a large numbers of shipyards built and military vessels come off the lines in large amounts from shipyards in space which produce Cruisers while frigates and corvette vessels are built on earth and are sent into space via space elevator. A large deposit of element zero is discovered Theories are completed they just lack power for completion work on Element zero Ftl Commences.

 **2088: Research** departments working on a way to synthesize element zero result in the creation of Anti-matter it would lead to the death of 30000 people due to it being on Luna and the destruction of a Habitat. This discovery leads to ways of making and the use of anti-matter with heavy regulations. Sirta Foundation invents medi-gel in the same year leading to further medical fields development it is both a year of mourning and hope.

 **2091:** The creation of a new armor alloy known as Titanium-A Battle-plate which is a Titanium and uranium-based alloy capable of taking large amounts of punishment from either kinetic strikes or High thermal type strikes and is used as the new starship armor.

 **2095:** Anti-matter power is made easy and cheap to produce along with better generators it shows that they are capable of producing the required energy for FTL. Construction of FTL drives commences while Element Zero FTL drives are completed and tested but cause a mass drain on stocks leaving it deemed too expensive till refined.

 **2098:** FTL Drive testing completed and deemed safe for use. Sol system has 13+Billion humans&120 million smart AI. Mass effect FTL deemed wasteful and slow Warp and Wormhole travel proved to be better in both speed and is less restricting.

 **2098-2197:** Humanity's weapons research has been miniaturized to fit into a small hand held weapons and is used as a new standard weapon, it also FTL is now normal and expansion starts this leads to humanity colonizing 35 habitable garden worlds. Warp drives are the standard system drives whilst wormhole stations are used to move large numbers of vessels quickly or over large distances but require large amounts of power. Piracy is crushed quickly and by law is grounds for death on the discovery in doing it.

 **2203:** Rising tension in 7 of the outer colonies occur and soon declare independence and strike at the core worlds military.

 **2203-2215:** Twelve years of bloody war leads to massive redesigns of naval vessels and improvements are made to space warfare doctrines and tactics. The core worlds crush the outer colonies alliance and establish control over them. The Old world Governments meet and establish the Systems Alliance which will be used to govern and protect all of humanity. The Ice moon above Pluto cracks open a dormant mass relay and is discovered. The Systems Alliance sends an expedition through. Arcturus Station is planned and is to be set up on the now discovered Arcturus system to protect the earth in case of attack through the mass relay. Anti-matter is turned into a weapon during the war.

 **2215-2253:** Humanity goes through a rapid phase of expansion through the relay network leading to the colonization of 9 more worlds on the relay network and another 6 off the relay network.

 **2257:** First Contact near Shanxi and is besieged by Pirates the next day.

 **HSF Dreadnought Talon, Bridge**

 **In the system of relay 314**

Admiral Orinia stood on the command bridge of the Dreadnought Talon as she stood tall and proud like all Turians should and radiated an aura of authority. She had her talons behind her back, watching her crew work, Looking to her data-screen and seen her flotilla in perfect order the 67th patrol fleet. Her fleet. At her command was 81 of the Hierarchy's finest warships patrolling the Asari terminus boarder, She had 30 cruisers and 50 frigates to support her

Alarm systems suddenly blared. Orinia blinked and looked to her sensor officer Castis''Report''

Castis looks from his data screen, a look of terror in his eyes remaining composed''Sensors indicate a large flotilla of pirate vessels, Admiral.''

''I can see that how many and what class of vessels are we looking at''

''We are detecting close to 2000 vessels that just came out the relay, most of them appear to be of Batarian design with other council warships mostly outdated '' Orinia was forced to compose herself at those numbers,She looked towards the system map''Take us to that relay we can't face that many so we can only hope to warn the others of this armada.'' She states in a firm voice not giving away how she feels

The crew on the bridge looked at her shocked for a moment before doing as ordered, She looked down''It will cost me my chance in the military but my men will live. Prepare codes for activation.'' she whispers to herself coming to terms with breaking the law.

 **HSS Dreadnought Domination, Bridge**

 **The system of relay 314**

The hegemony funded pirate fleet had just jumped into the system under the command of Porvan Gepnohan. He was deep in thought of the future slaves he would bring to the Hegemony with his great armada that he had gathered and was supported by a few of his government assets, He was suddenly aware of his sensor officer looking at him with fear in his eyes, he smiled at that ''What is it''

He broke eye contact ''We have contacts... sir, there Turian only 81 of them.'' he says a slight whimper in his voice

Porvan growled.''Send word to the fleet we must crush them before they warn the Hierarchy!'' anger clear in his voice

The sensor officer nodded, he looked at his station and read something. ''Admiral they are running from us shall we pursue, Porvan nodded then he said. ''There heading for that relay we will follow them and we will deal with them and then once they are gone we will launch our raid, But first send word to the hegemony to get me more ships to cover this side of the relay if an issue develops need to ensure they will not escape take and hold us near that relay we advance once we receive word from the Hegemony.''He grinned it was a good day to kill Turian scum, they were all meant to serve his kind he would do this for the Hegemony.

 **Time skip three days**

 **Shanxi Defence station, the orbit of Shanxi**

 **Captain Alex Montgomery**

 **Date:September 09 2257 15:37**

The colonization of Shanxi was well underway with all defensive forces and stations in place and bunkers and the capital city finally built and people moving in for the last month with the materials arriving weekly. He had a good feeling of his current situation confident that they were safe as he was at the head of a standard defense fleet and that no pirate actions had been occurring in the area at the moment. He looked over control room and smiled. His new command he hoped that he would not disappoint his old man.

Alex Montgomery was the eldest sibling of his family he had 2 other siblings both sisters. He had joined the Navy fresh out of high school right at the end of the insurrection. He had been selected to be in charge of the Shanxi defense fleet because of how his skills had impressed the higher ups now with what was standard defense fleet with 35 corvettes for policing actions. His last posting has been on the escort carrier Einstein been an XO.

At the moment he was enjoying a lovely steak and chips after he had completed all of the reports that were due for the day and was looking forward to the date he had lined up for that evening. He was in his formal navy dress uniform showing his rank clearly it's clear silver and gold trim mixing well with the overall blue. he had a clean shaving face with his black hair neat in a buzz cut.

'' **Captain, we have a situation you are needed in the CIC** '' Came to the announcement over the station's audio systems.

He got up and did a light jog up to the CIC which took him a good nine minutes to get to, He enters when the door slid open to see all the personal there he looked towards the stations AI,She was on a holo-table at the moment and had the appearance of a mid-twenties female wearing WW2 paratrooper gear holding onto an M1 Garand''Irene what's the situation'' his voice clean and crisp.

''The ODP's guarding the inactive relay are reporting that it has begun to show activity'' she states a little confused.

''Get me a connection to command so that we can report this we may have hostiles inbound, spin up the MAC guns and have our people land on the planet if they're not needed here send word to the fleet to go to combat status yellow'' HE orders his voice carrying a slight amount of worry

''Aye captain''

 **HSF Dreadnought Talon, Bridge**

 **Shanxi System**

Orinia stood deep in thought of what was about to happen she knew her chance for survival was low at best. ''Exiting relay in one minute'' The VI said emotionlessly

''Prepare to get us underway, ''she orders while she looks towards her data screen hoping that her plan of action would work because it was the only chance that her troops had.

''Admiral we have ships and orbital constructs in the system...they do not match any known designs'' and some of the there larger ships are registering only a small amount of eezo''She looks sharply to her data-screen and her eyes dilating a little.

''POWER DOWN THE WEAPONS WE CANT BE SEEN AS AGGRESSIVE!'' losing her composure. She looks down trying to remain composed with the current situation,"I just started a Spirits first contact and am bringing pirates to them, I will be lucky if I end up with a firing squad because of this assuming this new race doesn't just tear into us before those pirates."she looked up towards her view screen showing strange constructs and a fleet near the planet all looking both sleek and utilitarian. ''Send the first contact bundle and someone figures out how to warn them that we have a pirate armada coming in behind us, and what are their ship sizes it must be a defense fleet?.'' she asks a small amount of nervousness is easily heard in her voice.

''Ma'am the sensors are saying that they have a dreadnought and five medium weight cruisers and eight light cruisers and sixteen frigates with 35 patrol craft Ma'am''Answears Aultis in a jarring voice.

''The orbital constructs 25 000 kilometers out are looking on to us they have weapons ma'am,'' shouts Castis his voice going Frantic

''Spirits just keep the weapon systems cold we won't survive this without everything we have to fight that fleet.'' She all but shouts in small voice realizing her position.

The entire bridge is silent and tense"Who puts weapons on space constructs these people must be insane, I just hope that they don't shoot us" Exclaims one of the bridge crew.

''Ma'am we are receiving a transmission it seems to be a message and first contact package.'' said the communications officer his sub-harmonics showing relief.

 **''This is Captain Alex Montgomery, Senior officer of Shanxi defense fleet, of the Systems Alliance, State your intentions while we hope you are peaceful we will defend ourselves should you force us, we are no strangers to conflict''**

''It would seem by the tone they were using they are likely warning us.''Says Castis relieved

''ensure it's safe and lets hope we can make at least a partial understanding so that we can warn them'' she states in a calm voice trying to get a grip with the situation.

''It's safe Ma'am'' says Aultis

'' let's see it then and see what these people are like we are most likely going to be meeting them soon.''

The Images that were brought up showed pictures of male and female humans then showing there a form of a greeting which then changed to different pictures of Earth ancient armies up to the modern forces and cities with there flag at the end

Orinia was a little shocked at there appearance of the aliens which called themselves human they looked like Asari with only small differences."Spirits they look like Asari at least it seems they have a strong military culture if those images were anything to go by, I just hope they don't take as long to make decisions I might be here all year then." comments the admiral

''Ma'am we have an incoming hail'' Calls Castis

''Put it through,'' she orders sternly he posture becoming more rigid. _"They could not have figured out our language so fast could they."_

 **Shanxi Defence station, the orbit of Shanxi**

 **Captain Alex Montgomery**

''Captain the sensors are reporting that 81 vessels of unknown design it would appear we have a first contact situation''Irene says sounding extremely eager

''Good send all information that is gathered to high command and what is the status on our reinforcements'' he orders his voice and face giving away no emotion.

''Captain the nearest ships to the system is a single patrol fleet attached to the fifth fleet they are three hours out, command says that the expedition fleet was scheduled to head through relay 19 they are being diverted to us they will be here in about five days sir.'' Says Stephan his voice strictly professional as he was new and fresh out of Boot-camp.

''Good send word to general Williams to get the civilians into the bunkers and get ready for a possible invasion.'' Orders Alex His voice only giving the slightest hint of worry.

an elderly communications officer says''Sir we have an incoming information bundle'' his voice calm and reassuring.

''isolate a station and make sure it is not harmful Irene'' says Alex. _"please don't be hostile at least it seems there weapons are cold now."_

''Sir it appears to be a first contact package'' Irene says relief flooding her voice.

''Good I think it best we return the favor,'' Alex says confidently

''This is Captain Alex Montgomery, Senior officer of Shanxi defense fleet, Of the Systems Alliance State your intentions while we hope you are peaceful we will defend ourselves should you force us, we are no strangers to conflict'' he says in both a hopeful and slight threatening tone.

''Send that with our first contact bundle and Irene get working on a translation matrix immediately we need to talk to these people''Alex looks to the projector show us the information they sent us'' he says firm guise of a commander in place.

The Turian first contact package started by showing off the citadel and then all the races that had been discovered and what they were called showing peace and prosperity followed by pictures of the Turian Fleets guarding both planets and the citadel, this brought comments such as Blue Women sweet! And Space dinosaurs seriously.

''It would seem that they are peaceful the question I want to know is why they came through that relay with There weapons hot, Irene how is the translation going.'' He asks in a questioning tone.

''I have it at 80% completion, Captain there may be slight variations but I am confident that you can hold a small conversation with them, Orders?.'' she asks in an eager voice.

''Hail them and see why they ended up on our doorstep'' Alex orders

an image of an alien standing with her bridge crew dressed in their armor, Alex looks to who he assumes is the commander of this fleet with a neutral expression on his face.

''Welcome to Shanxi, Why are you here!'' he demands in slight threatening.

 **''I am Admiral Orinia of the 67th patrol fleet, we were running from... Slavers who had a larger fleet it was not known that you were here wh...''** states the admiral sounding only a bit conflicted.

''Irene sends an alert to high command, We have hostiles inbound I want our forces ready yesterday!. He looks back to the alien,He has a scowl on his face''Irene allow them through our defence platforms at the relay we need more people if we have to fight off these damned slavers and alert General Williams to get all the civilians in that bunker ASAP and those that are not in it to have weapons Turtle protocol is in effect as of this moment. Admiral, I want all you have on these slavers weapons systems speed and how long do I have before they get here and most importantly how many of them are there.'' He demands in a tone that brooks no argument and is easy to see that enraged.

Orinia stands still and rigid at the way of things just turned out" _How did they figure out our language_ , At _least they are getting ready I just hope they have more ships nearby or they will lose this planet."_ I will send over the information to you.'' she says slightly confused and taken back by the attitude of the commander and how quickly he had acted.

''Good also send whatever ground forces you have to the planet we may need them also I want you here so that we can make a plan to deal with this threat.''The transmission cut out after his demand.

''just fucking great there are aliens and they want to make us there slaves at least it seems the rest of the galaxy is civilized, Irene have you managed to enter their systems undetected.'' He asks his voice is cold and dead.

''Yes captain I have full access to there information network and am sending it to high command as we speak, They are genuine about the coming attack guess we are going to have to show the rest of the galaxy that we are not going to go quietly into the night.''She says with a feral grin on her face with a slight wink at the end.

''That is good prepare an honor guard to meet me at the hanger we will great them in the good old fashion way, and did you really just quote independence day.''He orders at first which slowly turns to exasperation.

 **Shuttle on route to Shanxi defense station**

 **16:47**

The shuttle was dim lit and spacius with so few aboard with only the pilots and guards beside both generals the view of the aliean dreadnaught growing in size.

''This is a terrible idea Admiral we don't know if we can even trust this species we just ran into them they are been for to trusting for my liking.''Says Desolas Arterius his mandibles in a deep frown.''We just don't know them, I don't like that you are putting us right into there sights why are you being so trusting.'' he grouches. His Armor showing decorated giving away his status.

She looks at him with a critical eye ''We don't have a choice in the matter we either trust them or we end up loosing more of our forces trying to hold them off...we need them to help us with this Pirate Armada, also I brought this on them they are likely angry with us for bringing this conflict to there doorstep,'' she says in a dejectedly while her head drops.

''I still think they won't be much help they must have only just reached interstellar travel since we have yet to run into them I doubt they're going to be much help.'' He says confidently.

Orinia looks to Desolas and shakes her head.''If you think like that then we are dead and you can pray to the spirits that we make it out of this because if you did not notice that station has a massive gun on it and it looks as if it can do some real harm to the fleet and we have been mostly stagnant on our weapons development for how long, the phaseton has only gone through nine redesigns in the last 300 years and they were all small improvements we have barely advanced since we met the council it's not hard to catch up to our technology if there based off the Protheans.'' Orinia states in a firm voice

Desolas was about to reply when the pilot says they are entering there hanger bay ''Admiral you best get ready.'' Eight guards stand and form a protective perimeter around both the admiral and general as they turn to the shuttle's door as it opens. They begin to walk out they see a long row of soldiers lined up on each side of the ramp with there commanding officer at the end in dress uniform.

Both sides walk to one another upon reaching each other Alex Montgomery salutes followed by a loud sound of boots slamming together and the honor guards rifles pointing directly up in perfect order. Startling the Turians, Though it brings grins to there faces whilst they return there own Turian salute.

''Welcome to the Systems Alliance while it is a pleasure to meet you and that you are peaceful I wish it could have been under better circumstances we will have to make do please follow me, ''he says his Omni tool translating what he says not portraying his grave tone.

''I must say Captain I am impressed at how easily you managed to figure out our language also I am glad you people have a dreadnought to protect your colonies, it may be the difference between our success and defeat,'' Orinia states confidently.

The Humans around her look confused for a moment'' I don't know if that was a translator mistake or you use different types of ship classes but we don't have a dreadnought we only have a heavy cruiser Admiral.'' states the captain only slightly confused.

The Turian delegation stop's and sharply looks to the captain ''WHAT DO YOU MEAN THAT IT IS A CRUISER! Says a few of the Turians.'' _"That is not good if they consider those cruisers that means they have a lot of them_ , If _that is the case that means that they have more large ships_ nearby _that can help, That also means that_ their _mainstay heavy ships are most likely over the number of vessels_ allowed _in that weight, I guess the politicians are going to be very busy soon.''_

Orinia attempts to make an effort to not show that it affected by the news and says ''well in our terms anything above 800 meters would classify as a dreadnought while your ships is just over that limit by a bit...,I have to ask what would you consider a... my flagship by your standards.'' sounding flusterd

 _"Please don't say that it would be considered a light dreadnought by your standards I don't want to see more destiny ascension class dreadnought's one of them is enough as it is."_ Orinia shudders at the thaught.

"I get the distinct feeling that this will cause issues in the future if that is how they reacted to our cruisers been that size at least I now know that our heavy cruisers are close to what they would consider there heavy hitters then how would they react to one of our flagships" He looks towards them and gives a friendly grin'' I would say that based on its size we would call it a battle cruiser in regards to our ship system's wonderful ships but nothing quite like a battleship those are a sight to see,'' he says in both a confidant and wistfully.

A sliding door opens into the stations CIC with multiple guards in the room their eyes firmly on their visitors well enough with the pleasantries we can leave the talking to the diplomats right now we need a plan of action'' given a sharp look to the Turians once he reaches the hole-table he begins to address everyone in the room.''We currently have a single patrol fleet en route that is 3 hours out we can expect them to arrive before the pirates, the expedition fleet which was the nearest main fleet is five days out while the 5th fleet is a week out from gathering enough of it task forces and arriving her which means that we have to provide support or stop this pirate fleet.''The captain looks to the admiral what number of ships are we looking at and what types I have yet to go through the data and I did not know their capabilities so brief us on what we are up against.'' he asks in a firm tone.

Orinia nods and moves to stand where the captain is and tries to maintain her nerves at having to brief all those present after the information she had just received.''from the scans that my ships managed to get before we went through the relay we discovered that there fleet has a single dreadnought class vessel and only 600 cruiserweight vessels with the remainder been frigate weight from our sensors whilst we were in transit we detected that they started there own transit two days after us but considering that they wanted to catch us they will ignore the safety restrictions we believe that they will arrive in system at least 18 hours from now she steps back and nods to the captain

''Irene please bring up a system map'' Alex orders.

''Yes captain''. her voice carrying great enthusiasm.

The Turians took a moment before they realized what had said that and General Desolas immediately looked to the holo-table''YOU USE AI'S ARE YOU ALL INSANE YOU WILL GET US ALL KILLED DISABLE THAT THING NOW!...'' his voice is strained and panicked as He starts to reach for his pistol and all of a sudden all the guards in the room have weapons aimed at the Turians.

Alex Montgomery looks towards the general with a glare''Yes we use AI'S we have done so for over a hundred years and have had no issues with them they are citizens of the Systems Alliance though assuming your reactions I am going to go out on a limb and say that you have bad experiences with AI''he gestures to the guards to stand down you may see this as an issue we do not.. so deal with it we have a bigger problem mainly the Huge slaver fleet that is heading this way at this moment I am having our craft deploy nuclear mines to inflict damage on them. "At least they did not know about the mines that were already at the relay we can not let them learn all of our secrets" ''Also you gave us numbers on their numbers I want to know how many strike-craft that they have I assume that they will have large amounts of them with a fleet of that size.''

Desolas was enraged and before he could go on another rant Orinia silences him with a glare and looks to the Captain her features schooled and neutral''Yes we can let the big bosses discuss that issue''Receiving glares from the humans''We still have to deal with the approaching fleet but they will not have any strike craft except for from the single dreadnought they are ineffective against main ships we don't field that many we only use them for planetary support''

She receives a raised eyebrow from the captain''Are you saying that you do not know the danger of strike-craft if that is the case we will educate you people and the pirates in how truly dangerous they are.''He says with a bloodthirsty grin ''This battle just got a whole lot easier, General have your men deployed to the ground we will be deploying our forces to the ground as well you will coordinate with general Williams on the ground to deal with those that are landing. We will not defend the planet we will be doing something a little more unorthodox. They have us outnumbered so we will lose if we try to defend we are going to have to support the ground and we can not do that if we are dead.''He dismissed the Turians and left to a viewing panel and looked towards the relay a distant look in his eyes.


	2. Chapter 2-Let loose the dogs of war

**Shanxi System 2257 September 10**

 **Captain Alex Montgomery**

He stood aboard the Resolute a battlecruiser overlooking his defence fleet of 234 vessels he only had two battlecruisers and five heavy cruisers he looked to the tactical table and looked at the carriers he had 26 of them "Our only hope is that our strike-craft and minefield even the gap enough to do the required damage to help the colony, We may not win this fight but I will make sure these bastards pay for there victory in their own blood.'' he stated feeling comfort in his jet black armour.

''Captain they are arriving within 10 minutes '' Rebeca says seriously an AI that was extremely dedicated to accurate readings while in a sciance coat. He nods and takes a deep breath

''Launch all strike-craft and go to red alert we will make these bastards pay, open ship-wide comm's'' He orders with an air of confidence and dread.

''To all of you in the fleet, today is the day that we do battle against a foul practice that comes to our shores! SLAVERY! we once sold our own kinsmen into doing that so long ago and we saw the light from such a dark practice. We are the SYSTEMS ALLIANCE NAVY the enemy is at the gate, I know that many of us will not see tomorrow but, I do know that we will not go quietly into the night for every one of us they kill we pay them back ten-fold! We shall not falter, we will give no quarter; they have chosen the path of damnation so we shall give them their reward.'' He finishes his speech with pure confidence taking a deep breath.

''LIBERTY OR DEATH!.'' He shouts.

Across the radio, there was one response''LIBRITY OR DEATH!.''He smiled and turned to the tactical table he had a battle to win.

 **Admiral Orinia**

She had just listened to the human's speech and was a little speechless, she heard one the helmsmen say''Spirits they sound almost excited for the coming fight are they like Krogan.''

A bunch of people voiced there agreement she could only shake her head at that. She looked to the tactical display''I wonder why the Humans were so insistent that it would be their strike-craft that will win this day I mean they seem useless to have you ever heard of anything like this.''she looks to her support staff and they just shake there heads.''This is race will be good allies for the hierarchy they are kind of like us militaristic but I would also have to say that they are like the Krogan who looks forward to a fight where we are so badly outnumbered, well them apparently, open comm's to our fleet.'' She says slightly confused.

''Turian's of the hierarchy today we stand beside new allies to face one of our most constant foes, We may not be many but this is our sacred duty we stake our honour on this fight today,WE WILL HOLD THE LINE,We are Turian we do not break we are the best military in the galaxy we will show these pirate scum the error of there ways,we will show the humans how we fight today to let us not bring shame to our families.'' she gives her speech filled with zeal and confidence.

 **Admiral Porvan**

''Admiral the Frigates you sent ahead have just arrived, they are reporting the Turians and unknown vessels numbering just over 200 they report...7 dreadnought vessels admiral!'' Shouts his sensor operator.

''It matter not we have the numbers and I doubt these newcomers will be any challenge they are all weak compared to the might of the Batarian Hegemony they will be showing the error of there ways when they are at my feet they will be our slaves.'' He snidely remarks.

''Admiral we are leaving the relay in five minutes what formation shall we...'' The Xo is cut off from a call from the comm's officer.

''Admiral the scouts are being engaged by...!long-range fire they are reporting a large amount of strike craft of moving to there position.'' He says frantically.

''If the captains are unable to deal with pathetic annoyances I will have them executed there should be no problem with pathetic strike-craft.'' He snarls at his crew.

''Sir scout force is no longer reporting in'' Says the confused officer sounding completely baffled.

''!WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY ARE NO LONGER REPORTING IN'' " He angrily demands. _''It must have been a_ minefield _only thing that could have wiped them out so quickly good thing it was just them we have more than enough to deal with these new slaves"_

 **Captain Alex Montgomery**

He watched the tactical table as the 300 frigates moved into the minefield he gave a nod to Irene''do it'' and a second sun was born where the frigates were, a satisfied smile on his face

''All contacts destroyed Captain.'' States Rebeca a maniacal grin on her holographic face now dressed in WW2 uniform.

''Good have our strike-craft lay in wait near the relay the main force will be here tell them to target their frigates after we take out their battlecruiser we need to reduce there anti strike-craft capabilities if we are to see this through,the real fight is about to begin, have this broadcast to the hostile leader in Turian.''Welcome to Shanxi we welcome you in the traditional manner of your kind we hope you enjoy your lead-filled holiday.'' He says jovially.

''Have all weapon batteries fire on possible exit path's I want as many of them dead before they can organize there systems will be going to hell with all that radiation coupled with our ECM countermeasures,'' he commands the fleet.

shells leave there MAC cannons while strike-craft are alerted to the friendly munitions from there AI assistants and onboard VI's.

''Captain they have arrived''. Rebecca says looking down the scope of her rifle and pulling her trigger and the ships main cannon firing her third shot at a cruiser the fleet followed their orders and all batteries fired on designated targets.

''Captain there returning fire it seems inaccurate for the moment no losses yet enemy have lost fifty of there frigates to the first barrage and the station is beginning its bombardment.'' She reports keeping her voice carefully contained.

''Good have the Resolute take the front with the Herald and Night-gale we will use our heavy hitter's to take as many rounds as possible I want them to cycle with the Frontier and Utopia when their shields drop below 15% keep the fleet dispersed as possible make us the biggest target, time till our strike-craft hit there dreadnought and cruisers.'' He orders

''Hostile fleet is too dense admiral they are unable to take it out orders'' reports a comm's officer his voice slightly stressed.

''Have them switch to secondary targets we will have to hope we get a shot'' states the captain as he watches the battle unfold on the sensors.

 **Shanxi System space battle**

The defense fleet moved around staying at a distance executing evasive maneuvers avoiding all the fire that the enemy fleet put out while the defense fleet that was split into four assault groups while their carriers remained out of range with all the Hermes stealth frigates and two Artemis destroyers. They continued to exchange fire knocking ships out with the long-range artillery support from the ODP and defense stations that were firing with aided guidance systems. The Batarian fleet began to close into knife fighting range while the long range of the defense station and ODP's around the planet could no longer offer support without risk of friendly fire. The Batarians no longer affected by radiation was now able to target the defense fleet with a little more ease still struggling against the ECM . While the strike-craft of the carrier group continued to launch wave after wave of the deadly ordinance at the fleet but began to take heavy anti-strike-craft fire doing minimal damage to the craft but the large amounts of flak was causing fewer munitions and strike-craft to return for repairs.

The first ships to fall were the corvettes and frigates due to the large amounts of firein space leading to them taking a pounding even though they used the larger ships as cover.

from so many enemy vessels. Battle lines began to blur as the defense fleet was slowly surrounded by the larger number of vessels, changing from knife range combat for some of the battle groups to near point-blank combat.

ships blinked out of existence as they rammed and set off their reactors when they were crippled and dying to take as many forces as possible, Strike wings continued to hammer the outer layer of the Batarian fleet and managed to cripple a large number of vessels.

''Captain Shields are at 20% integrity we can't handle this much fire the Reaver has been cut off she just had her escort pull off and support other battle groups. Captain their shields are down and there armor is taking to many rounds they're going to ram that cruiser.''Came Rebecca's voice sounding overwhelmed.

''Captain the Turians are almost gone they only have the talon and 12 of there cruisers'' Shouts the Comm's officer her voice sounding Composed with tinges of fear.

''Have them pull out and protect our carriers the rest of the fleet will cover them!''As he barks while this happens the Resolute's barriers fall and they take a hit he is knocked around in his chair.

''What is the status of the fleet?''

''The Reaver is immobile but letting her secondary batteries take names, we lost the Herald while the night gale still has her shields and has five of our light cruisers with her they are pushing deep into the enemy formation to distract there Battlecruiser. The Frontier is damaged but still operating and is been covered by the Utopia'' reports Rebeca her voice becoming slightly glitchy.

The Artemis destroyers have managed to get a lock and are close enough to the enemy battlecruiser and are in the process of destroying it the rest of the fleet is spread out and trying to take as many vessels with them also heat levels from the reactors and exterior plating is at 13% before we have to cool off.''

The Resolute's armor starts to reach the final layer has it takes more rounds most of it weapons slowly go silent''GO RAMMING SPEED LETS TAKE A FEW MORE OF THESE **Bastards**! Rebeca upload to Shanxi.''He looks to the crew.''It was an honor to serve with you all.'' he whispers while Taking three more cruisers and a frigate in the explosion that follows it's destruction.

The battle only lasts nine hours in which only thirteen Turian vessels along with the carrier group and three damaged Artemis destroyers flee towards Shanxi. The Defence platforms are the last to fall silent in the battle near the relay along with all nearby sensors leaving the fleet blind to that sector of space while they pull out they deploy mines and sensors to provide scanning.

 **Admiral Orinia**

The bridge of the talon has sparks flying around it with some consoles flickering only a few of them working and the bridge crew sporting injuries in varying degrees Orinia looks at the view screen of the approaching fleet that had taking time to lick its wounds,human strike-craft waves continued to return some damaged and them refusing to allow repairs while others set up sensors and screened the area.''Tuvia what is the status of the fleet and what of the human's ships.'' asks Orinia her voice strained and tired.

''Ma'am all of our ships are reporting damage and engineering is reporting that our aft kinetic barriers are damaged and we only have around 70 percent engine power and the main guns heat sink is slightly damaged it can only fire at half the standard rate,of seven seconds the human battle group is still mostly fine but has only a few vessels that can fight three of which are damaged there strike-craft are still mostly there but they say that there all damaged they reported that only 113 of there strike-craft are fully operational while another 1200 are still combated capable and around 1500 of them are in need of field repairs, and around 400 in need of at least a full day and a half before they are combat capable,'' reports Castis his voice showing signs of fatigue.

'' Well tell them that to pull back for now and save there strike-craft for later we have seen how dangerous they are to the enemy fleet we will need them for the last push before we jump to our assembly sight'' _"The human strike-craft an interesting idea that worked a little to well for my liking they tore apart so much of the enemy fleet even when outnumbered ,they did more damage to that fleet than even what we could do with the number we had by all rights we should have only destroyed a quarter of there fleet being so badly outnumbered but the humans."_ She shivers at the thought of how they fought in space. "They fight like the krogans with discipline I mean who rams your ships into them just to get what was left of the enemy and worse they seemed to detonate there ships core's in the middle of the engagement they seemed to not care about there lives, what have they been doing throughout there history killing one another all the time." She says in both awe and shock as She looked to her tactical display and it showed that the fighting had stopped for now and relaxed a little the enemy fleet seemed to have lost close to three-fifths of the there entire fleet. She had to smile such few numbers and the slavers had paid for the victory in blood it seemed and smiled.

 **Admiral Porvan**

He could only stare in shock at the tactical display of the mind flayer of a Batarian cruiser his great armada had been beating by a measly 200 odd ships he growls and pulls a pistol on his XO ''What happened how did they manage to destroy my dreadnought and leave me with only 457 ships you incompetent fool you said they would be easy and that we did not need a plan.'' he fired his weapon till it overheats in to the XO head leaving the head full of holes leaking bits of brain that had been pulverized he walked over to his head and lifts his boot and brings it down you were a pathetic piece of filth,LET THIS BE A LESSON FOR BEING INCOMPETENT!.'' He shouts while aiming his pistol at others while growling.

''Sir there strike-craft are pulling back for the moment'' Shouts a relived sensor officer while slightly whimpering.

''Good reform the formation and get repairs underway we launch as soon as were organized and can someone tell me how our guardian lasers were useless against those bloody strike-craft and why our barriers were useless against these other vessels?.'' He demands.

He received no answer and none of his bridge crew looked at him''Pathetic excuses the hegemony will have our lives for failing such a raid launch the attack!.'' He orders with ruthless zeal.

 **Space battle over Shanxi**

Strike-craft for the humans are the first to arrive in the fleet and launch their payloads with the majority reaching their target taking another 27 vessels while crippling another 9 of them but they lost another 17 of there strike-craft while all of them are showing signs of damage.

The defence station is the next to open up on the enemy fleet taking out a frigate with each shot that it takes,the Turians follow with a barrage while slowly withdrawing with the rest of the combined fleet,the Batarians return the barrage in kind focusing on the defence station main gun as well as the Turian dreadnought second wave of strike-craft arrive and launch there volleys early only taking out another 13 vessels but crippling 47 more vessels that were damaged in previous engagement,A lucky strike from a Batarian cruiser cripples the stations main gun but not before the station claims it's 137th victim defence fleet jumps to FTL to prepare for further confrontations and the Batarians take up orbital supremacy while launching boarding craft for the station.

 **Defence Station Commander Gayle Price**

He looks to the tactical screen he and sees that he has the standard complement, Irene had already been uploaded to the command bunker on the planet, He looked to the self-destruct clock it had ten seconds on it ready to blow at a moments notice all stations around him powerd down and unmanned.

''Commander their craft is nearly here we are ready at all junctions and the ambush in the main hanger is ready, All information on the station has been scrubbed.''Reports Savana her voice tinged with regret she was one of his squad leaders her black armor shining with her assault rifle held firmly her stance proud.

He nods to his second in command and shoulders his rifle and begins to move towards the hanger.''Hold this location with your squad and blow it once they break through till then were going to make these bastards bleed before we go down.'' He says in a firmly while also tinged with regret and acceptance.

He arrives in the hanger large amount of crates and sand bags litter the area near the door with a few machine gun nests through out the hanger, as the shuttles begin to enter the hangar he takes cover. The Batarians are turned to paste as three rockets each are shot at two of the shuttles turning them into mangled wrecks along with there troops this is soon followed by the heavy machine guns tearing into the troops attempting to leave there shuttles,''Don't let up if they get through here we won't set up another kill box the heavy Calibre bullets tearing into them leaving them nothing more than piles of gore and flesh. The Batarians bring in the krogans in the second wave and using their heavy armor to tank the shots for the rest of the wave to make it.

''Why the hell is our barriers not working there tearing us apart''Shouts a Batarian cowering behind a wreck of one of the now multiple destroyed shuttles.

''Shut it you pyjack this is an amazing fight and these things seem to have a backbone.''Says a krogan in blood red armor who is in the process of unloading.''I AM KROGAN!.''He shouts and charges only to take a bunch of rounds and his armor buckling halfway towards the line sending him to his grave his body turned into a pile of flesh. There wave making it to the line and begin to get through. Gayle price is the last to fall as he takes down one more shuttle before setting off a set of explosives all along the line.

A private takes his grenades and a pack of c10 and primes them and charges at a group of Krogan once he arrives he shouts.''Victory or Death! .As he sets them all off the explosion sends bits of the body all over the hanger. It is not long before they are pushed into the alleys of the station

The fighting last for forty minutes with shots traded over the entire station paid for in blood by the slavers they lose close to 4000 men just to arrive at the control station once they enter a Batarian is greeted by a shotgun to the face his squad behind him raise there weapons until they see a countdown behind the female soldier hit **0:00** ''Victory or Death!'' is the last thing they hear as the station explodes taking all on board her with it.

 **Admiral Porvan**

He could only watch as the station in which he hoped to gather information from blew up with close to 10000 of his men aboard it, his hands are clenched into tight fists, his face contorted into a silent rage he looks at his cowering crew and sneers.''This is pathetic can we not deal with these primitive species that are inferior to us you are all a disgrace to the hegemony for been so incapable he says over the ship-wide communication array. It matters not we will still gather the slaves from below begin the invasion!.'' He shouts at his forces over the channel.

 **Captain Siliana on board the escort carrier Vixen**

She looked at the tactical report of her carrier group and could not help but cringe at the numbers looking at it they only had 700 odd strike-craft capable of combat with a good portion of them needing repairs with over 2000 of them needing repairs before they would ever leave the hangers and there best case scenario was at least 3 days before they were all capable of another attack in large numbers, she rubbed the bridge of her nose and glanced at her working crew all showing signs of frustration at the situation.''We need to get some Intel for the colony for general Williams to send the Orca Artemis destroyer to take an orbital position for the moment we will rotate them out with someone else in a day.'' she say's with a frustrated tone.

''Ma'am the Turian Admiral has just arrived she wants to further discuss our plans without risking it been intercepted,''stated Elliot the AI his voice downcast.

Siliana looks to her tactical pad while deliberate and tapping her fingers on the table, the door into the bridge opens up and Orinia steps in and waves her guards off and steps up to the table, the strain of losing so many of her fleet visible but well hidden.

''What is the plan my fleet will support your but I don't know how badly you lost in your strike-craft and what is the fleets combat capabilities,''Orinia asks the pain clear in her voice.

''At the moment we have to repair the majority of them we are combat ineffective,I believe the best course of action at the moment is that we should repair and wait for reinforcements to arrive the expedition fleet is only a few days away and we could regroup with them while we use our stealth vessels to provide intelligence gathering for the defenders on the colony and maybe launch a few hit and run's, the colony should be able to hold easily they got a rather large contingent of grounds forces from us before the battle so we're good there and they will have more than enough defences from what we managed to gather they have 24 Orbital defence tanks on the ground so they will be able to avoid any orbital bombardment and the civilians were all evacuated to the shelters and General Williams is an Insurrection veteran general so they should be able to hold out for a few days under his command,'' she says confidently.

''Ma'am, Admiral, the Fugu is reporting the 300 enemy vessels just came through the relay they don't seem to be armed so we are assuming they are transports,''stated Elliot he looks to the Admiral and shows a picture for confirmation.

''Yes they are transports most likely loaded with ground forces anything else.''Elliot nods''Yes we managed to intercept their transmissions it stated that another fleet was on its way and that they would be here in 2 days it would seem they had more forces waiting by also we managed to hack into there database and steal vital information on where this raid was launched from as well as multiple bases in which they were gathering their forces.

Orinia face contorts into what the humans assume is a smile''This may be an unfortunate accident that this had to happen but with this we will be able to cripple their activity for a while if we can get my people to act on the information.'' she says in an upbeat tone. she looks at the tactical table and nods her head's ''All we can do is wait now for your people.'' she says in a slightly defeated as she begins to leave whilst nodding to the captain to recover from the day's battle.

 **STG Stealth vessel Shadow**

unnoticed because of all the debris around the relay the STG vessel attached to the system that had seen the activation as well as the battle that had occurred near the relay and the first contact of this new race they silently powered up there ship and headed to the relay. ''We must warn the Council of what has happened here we need to resolve this before it escalates and get a diplomatic envoy here immediately no new technology of this race gathered as all of there vessels and constructs to badly damaged must make haste if we are to return and try to gather information.'' The STG captain says rapidly as they take the relay back to council space to Alert the council.

 **Codex On the Cold War**

With the investment in the economy of the Soviet Union lead to the ability to lead a better campaign in proxy wars leading to the majority of the South America Governments to support them securing them the continent.

The Asian Countries while not contributing in large amount to historical points were the most renown for forming there own alliance and were neutral throughout the war while both the Allies and soviet union tried to gain there support, they never did,it was commonly agreed that it was because of this event that leads to the cold war not becoming hostile due to the fact the a document was signed by the Pan-asian collective that should one of the super powers be the aggresor they would aid the innocent party.


	3. Chapter 3-Reactiones

**Arcturus Station**

 **High Council Meeting**

Around the conference room seated all the Around the table in a room with the Arcturus sun visable on display illuminating the room, only Admiral Hackett and the president were present with all other Admirals and the vice president on the QEC systems of Arcturus. The Admirals were all dressed in their formal uniforms while president Karl Franz and vice president James Huss were in suits. ''We received a report from Shanxi three hours ago that mass relay activated and an unknown fleet came out, it was later found out that these unknown forces are called Turians and apparently fled from a Pirate armada that is hot on their tail and is only about two thirds of a day out,'' says Admiral Hackett in a deep and confident voice, he looks to Admiral Shepard. ''What is the status of your fleet Shepard you are the closest main fleet to this threat and because of the wormhole station not being delivered there yet you won't have reinforcements till you use the Valhalla to establish a wormhole corridor so what is your time of arrival.'' He asks in the same voice.

Shepard nods her face Grim. ''The fleet was already about to go through a relay when the call came in now as you know my fleet is all ways ready for combat in case of the most likely first contact we were to discover but without the wormhole station that what would usually only take an hour to arrive at the colony has forced us to take the long route the expedition fleet will be there in 81 hours. We were lucky that my fleet was mobile at the time otherwise this could have taken much longer to just organize and get underway, we got lucky,'' she says in a measuredly.

The president nods. ''We were lucky as is I am going to have the fifth fleet mobilized into a war fleet. The elements from the second and third fleets are being put into effect to cover the area of fifth fleets operation I want the expedition fleet to head for wherever their seat of power is for this alliance and I want the expedition fleet renamed into the retribution fleet you will handle our counter-offensive, Shepard. Admiral Hackett you are going to be active around all relays that could enter our space we need to send a message we will not take this provocation lying down. This council seems to have no spine if they are unable to deal with simple pirates that they could actually become such a threat, we will show them how to do the job. Now that we have discussed our immediate actions once our fleets are done I suggest that we use this to spur the economy into building more ships for the military as we have seen if pirates are able to field such large numbers it will not be good for us. Therefore I am suggesting that we double our colony defences while it will have to pass through the parliament we have to be careful we are alone and this coalition may be a danger to us also I want two new fleets to begin construction immediately and to also bring the exploration fleet to a fully fielded fleet to match the others,we will use the emergency fund to get that going so that we can manage the more than likely wave of expansion that is to come or the very strong possibility of war, therefore, we should also prepare plans to go to a war footing should that occur. So what do we know about these aliens.'' He asks in a kindly with an air of Authority.

Admiral Hackett was the one to reply ''The reports I received indicate that they are heavily dependent on element zero for all there technology which means that they will be very interested in our technology and the good news is that from what we can tell is that these aliens consider anything above 800 meters to be dreadnought class ships which means that in heavy vessels we have them outnumbered but we can easily speculate that they have a much larger number of small vessels also there industry could possibly out size us by are large factor but it would seem that they fail to see how useful strike-craft really are in this manner it would seem they have not developed them and use only a light amount of point defence for protection and that there own strike craft are more or less used to support them in planetary invasions and they are under developed to the point of a non-threat at the moment I also suggest that we up the production of smaller vessels instead of the larger ones to increase our fleet size if they do make use of smaller ships more than large ones, but we should keep the current composition of fleets and just add the smaller vessels to ensure our tactics are not effected. Then we also have managed to take information that was confidential as we managed to discretely hack from them we have had the AI analyze the information and have found some glaring issues that need to be discussed for our own security.'' He says warily.

''The first thing that has to be discussed is the treaty of Farixen this-.''

 **The Citadel Asari Embassy**

Tevos was seated drinking Thessian tea going over the day's reports of what the Matriarchs had planned as well as demands from both the volus and Elcor on council seats. She sighed it seemed that it was mostly repetition as of late with all the requests and trying to keep the Turians from going on a warpath in the terminus systems. She could only think that it was a useless waste of life to try and clean up the pirate vermin that held that sector of space it was not as if they suffered not with it being the Asari and Salarians who had the most interest in the areas. She could see why they wanted to stop it but it just would damage there own interests and with the secret agreement that the Salarian Union and Asari Republics had to ensure that the Turians remained good little guard varren doing as they were told. It did not help that they were beginning to have doubts about the council with all the stonewalling.

She looks to her Omni-tool when it flashes alerting her to a priority message she groans had today not been busy enough she would have had a smile with all the plans coming to a head. ''Arysa prepare a transit shuttle to the council room it would appear that an issue has come up,'' she says in a bored and tired way that is easily conveyed.

''right away councilor shall I alert the Council of matriarchs to be ready for when you are done with what has come up.'' her receptionist asks in a lightly, Tevos nods to her reply while heading to the shuttle, A short ride later.

Once arriving at the council chambers were all important matters were discussed Tevos enters to see that both Varlin the Salarian councilor and Caivus the Turian councilor were both already seated and waiting for Tevos she puts a fake smile that is perfectly practiced. ''What was so important that it required our attention to be called so suddenly Varlin I am pretty sure that all matters have been discussed today,'' she says confidently with a slight air of superiority.

''Yes yes all has been discussed that we knew about but new information greatly troubling a relay was activated 3 days ago.''At this, he gives a pointed look to Caivus. ''BY THE TURIANS! Who was attempting to flee a pirate fleet,'' he says violently.

Tevos looks to Caivus with a glare. ''What are your people thinking Caivus are you trying to cause an issue like the racni war again they had better not have caused such an issue or your people will suffer greatly.'' _''Sanctions make for lovely punishments and it will cause there already weak economy to collapse if not maintained good thing they will always be in our_ _debt,''_ she says threateningly.

Caivus looks at Tevos with rage. _''Does she truly think that good Turians should die for the possibility of another racni war, yes it could happen but that was so long ago.''_ ''That is completely out of the question that was over 2000 years ago we could have handled it I have argued that the law on relays should be changed because of a ridiculous idea that we will find something we don't like! but if we opened them we would find any threats much earlier as of this moment. Let's not forget that your two's idea of stopping any kind of Turian response to the pirates and slave raids in the terminus not to mention that the Batarians are causing more issues if you would let us do as we are supposed to then nothing like this would have happened in the first place. I can only hope that you see what you are doing because my government is getting tired of all the crap we do how long have my people been patrolling your territory we would be less pressed had you let us do our jobs.'' he raves at them.

Before a heated debate can break out Varlin interrupts. ''ENOUGH! While there are a few issues that should be discussed that is not why I called it appears that there was an unknown race on the other side of the relay which resulted in a first contact,'' he says firmly

Tevos is the first to respond.''Then we have to send a diplomatic envoy to ensure that this is just an accident and not an act of war.'' she says confidently.

''Relax Tevos it would appear that the Turians of the 67th patrol fleet managed to get in contact with this new race and tried to defend the colony that was there with this species own forces, which I might add were extremely effective even though the entire combined fleet was only 200 odd vessels and outnumbered by roughly 9 to 1 odds they have inflicted close to over 70% damage the pirate fleet. The STG team that was monitoring the relay stated that there were more forces on the way to this colony but most disturbing is that this race had five dreadnought class vessels nearby so we speculate that either they have different classes for there vessels and are in an element zero rich area to be able to build so many. We also now know that strike-craft is a dangerous weapon when used correctly this race had 26 vessels dedicated to the use of deploying them and are responsible for roughly 23% of the destruction of the pirate fleet. That is all that our team managed to learn there firewalls were extremely advanced we can assume they were like this because of the battle nothing else was recovered.'' he states slightly dejected.

Caivus looked both stunned and happy. ''So what your saying is that my people fought alongside unknown species and fought and took down a good portion of the pirates, I am impressed at there abilities but I have to ask what are the chances they pose a significant threat to us.'' _''and are they a better choice down the line,''  
_ he says jovially.

''We do not know but the fact that they leave dreadnought class vessels to guard their colonies either means they have an abundance of large capital ships or we are dealing with a race who has a small amount of territory,and as much as I hate to admit it your people helping to defend a colony world of there's will help for that I suggest that we get to sending a fleet to help these people,'' she says with slight amount of venom coating her words directed to Caivus.

Tevos nods a large number of thoughts going through her head. ''Yes Caivus I want this to be done quickly so we can avoid a first contact war, what is the status of a nearby fleet been able to get there,'' she asks carefully measuring her voice.

Caivus looked uncomfortable shifting in his seat. ''A fleet was already on route to that relay system when we got an emergency wide burst signal used for events like this they will be there within 3 days from the system with relay 314,'' he states confidently.

Tevos just stands up heading for the door. ''I have to alert my government about this so we can get things underway this first contact is bad enough as it is,'' she says urgency easily seen in her voice.

As she leaves, an unseen battle under the surface with the circumstances that had just happened _.''This is great so many new things we could learn and cultures to learn, but how will the others react to this plans will have to be put on hold for this at least it would keep the Turians busy now and stop complaining about all of this.''_

As she made her way down she would never know the world of politics to be so simple ever again and how little the Asari were prepared to be left stumped by these newcomers.

 **Caivus**

As the other councilors left he could not help but be happy with this turn of events and began to move towards his communication room he had to alert the Primarchs and the Admiral of this development. He was no fool the STG had been detected more than a few times in the past he was certain that they were not watching the relays and were watching them instead. The Turian people were getting tired of the way they were used, countless generations of good Turians dying for Citadel space only to be repaid with more warships and an economy that was hardly staying afloat as it is. Thinking back to the meeting this new people seemed to be militaristic no other way they could have learned what it meant for combat vessels to be so good and most of the other races would have suffered far worse not to mention run away while his people suffered but this race had dreadnought class vessels also which means they know how dangerous they are. At least this race had the honor of fighting beside complete unknowns. arriving by the communications room keying the Primarch.

''Primarch Fedorian we have a development the 67th patrol fleet activated a relay trying to escape a pirate armada they have inadvertently caused a first contact which they are now helping to defend this new race,'' he says worry clear in his voice

''I understand I will alert the others to this also why not just send a priority message instead of talking,'' he asks carefully while looking questionably at him.

''I would have done that if I had not learned something that would be extremely beneficial towards us it would appear by what we know so far that this race is militaristic because they have dreadnought class ships,'' he says happily

''I see so why do you think they can help us I doubt that this new group will be anything useful to us, I doubt they have any significant navy or infrastructure,'' he says with a small amount of confidence.

''Yes but they have a different approach to warfare it seems.'' He brings up an image of the Carriers.'' These vessels carry large amounts of strike-craft that were extremely capable of harming the pirate fleet, I suggest we seek them out and try to get them as allies they may be a better option the way things are going.'' he asks hopefully.

''I will consider it but not before we have more information if your observations are correct we may do just that,'' he says gravely.

''We don't have a choice we can't keep the secret that civil unrest is getting critical with how things have been going either this species unites us and we stay as we have or we join them,'' he says completely serious.

He disconnects the call and takes a seat relaxing into the chair trying to calm down with all the issues that he has to deal with. _''We will not falter at such a critical time.''_

 **Codex**

 **Ramming Speed in the Alliance:** Not the traditional sense as it used to be used in surface warfare in the navy space ramming in the Alliance is an In system FTL Jump to the target ship and the detonating of all ordinance onboard the vessel along with its reactor which leads to hypervelocity shrapnel damaging the target.

 **Note:** I am looking for a Beta Reader to help me fix my grammar issues, I am still going to update still and just going to fix it when I find someone


	4. Chapter 4-Planet Fall

**General Williams Command Bunker**

He looks to the AI that had been moved down to his bunker she had been moping about not been apart of the battle that had occurred in space. Now that General Williams thought about it, a lot of AI had a tendency to want to be involved in any battle then again it did not help that a lot of there parents were in the military. As he looks towards his family picture with his wife and two sons, it was supposed to be there birthday next week. He promised that if he made it through this he would look for a nice safe core world, he sighs as he begins looking to the alien that was currently with him he remembered that his name was Desolas and that one of his men had remarked that it was the return of the dinosaurs, he has seems to have what he assumes to be a firm frown with the number of his grumblings that he had been spewing.

''I don't like your plan general it leaves us to thin we have to respond with total force and it is against pirates I am sure our weapons are up to the task alone and that we are not at risk of orbital bombardment because of what they want we should have all of our forces ready in one location to limit the risks.'' Desolas Arterius had been complaining that there were not enough men around the landing zones and that they would break through and take his people with ease.

He snorted at the irony of what he was saying. ''Yes I would agree with you had they not all ready broken the law not to mention we know Urban warfare general trust me when I say these scum will pay in blood the entire advance and we have defences all over the place.'' looking at the tactical display he had 27 600 marines and 460 IFV and 150 Standard AA and 33 MBT from the reinforcements in the defence fleet to bolster the garrison of 3000 marines and 70 AA of which 24 were for orbital defence and only 30 IFV and 20 more MBT. He smiled he had a rather large force to defend the colony with not to mention. The army was spread out through the entire city laying in wait with all possible entryways guarded by HMG emplacements with the landing zones been covered from all directions and the Space-port that was meant to be replaced by a space elevator next month was filled with explosives and surrounded should they break through the forces holding it then these slavers would meet a fiery end. The vehicles like the MBT and IFV were all in underground structures. That would allow for an effective counter-attack and out of sight while the AA vehicles were evenly placed throughout the city and his Orbital defense vehicles ready to roll out should they bring their ships into range. The Civilians had been sent to bunker the second the attack learned of so there were no risks to them and the militia would only be called if it was needed.

''Your forces are to support in the counter-attack that we have laid out once they have pushed far enough, should I Expect any surprises that you have not informed me of yet.''

''Yes there is a chance that they bring down slaves here to maintain their equipment or as distraction forces these people generally have an explosive device to ensure they follow the orders given.''

He nodded and frowned.''We will have to deal with that, what is the status of there landing Irene.''

''There the first wave has arrived at the star-port and are surveying the surrounding area for more landing sites.''

He looked at the tactical display and took a deep breath.''Open fire on them let none leave alive.'' He says over the tactical channel

Teams positioned all around the city activated there AA weapons knocking out fighters and shuttles all over the city while the forces at the star-port started to rain down lead on the Batarian forces already disembarked.

 **Captain Ghorek**

He looked around the shuttle at the thirty men with him. ''Listen up you idiots the first wave is currently stuck at the star-port we are not landing there.''He taps his Omni-tool and projects an image of a plaza.''This is where we are landing with elements of the second wave while the rest of it heads to the meat grinder at the star-port, we will be setting up a secondary base here and then pushing towards those incompetent fools at the star-port the first-''

His shuttle took a sharp bank knocking around everyone followed by large numbers of alarms blaring.''What are you fools doing in there get us to the-!'' the last thing he sees is flame.

His transport is shot out of the sky well before arriving raining down flaming wreckage onto the surrounding wilderness.

 **Lieutenant Trever Everett**

He lay atop one of the many buildings surrounding the spaceport, he was one of the few snipers in the area, he smiled and scoped another officer that was barking orders to other units and pulled the trigger turning the idiots head into mush as he fell down he looked for his next target. _''These idiots make it easy to kill those in charge they never here of trying to keep a low profile.''_

''Watch out there sending a frigate into the atmosphere to provide support take cover.'' Came over the tactical communication channel.

He looked up to see the strangely designed vessel as it got closer the unmistakable sound of the defense tanks fired. A loud thunder echoed in the city causing him to wince, the frigate was going down and it had a good deal of holes in it when he looked through his scope.

''Okay people get out of the danger zone were blowing it there the third wave is inbound and we are starting to lose ground you have five minutes till detonation.''

 **General Williams**

He watched as his forces pulled back away from the danger zone and watched as the third wave began to land and deploy there vehicles and troops and began to set up around the spaceport as they began to pull out. ''General our forces are out of the zone a minute ahead of schedule.''

''Good set off the charges take them out.'' He watched as the spaceport went up in a large fireball taking with it the majority of all the landed forces, he smiled

''General there sending more Frigates down to try and offer support again.'' States Irene with a feral grin.

''Well we will just have to educate them on what happens when they enter our range take them out again until they learn their lesson because we have plenty of ammo to go around.''

Desolas could only stare at the tactical display in wonder at what was happening the Batarians were been lead into a slaughterhouse and he did not understand how they were been so successful his troops had yet to be deployed to shore up any breaches but the Batarians were still trying to land and we losing entire units before landing,he did not like the idea of fighting these humans he was sure that if it were Turians in there place they would be having the same amount of progress. ''How long do you think it is until they set up their forward base,'' Desolas says looking towards Williams.

''My best guess would be that they set it up outside the city they have yet to set up any holdout zones my guess is that they will begin to land in the outskirts and push in, we just have to hold them.''

 **Admiral Porvan**

Porvan looked at his tactical display trying to get control of the rage that had been building up throughout the entire siege and space battle. His forces were proving to be completely useless in doing a simple job, to begin with, looking over the status of the invasion he already felt happy he had already got rid of a few others in charge he would be going home rich with there spoils. He seen that he had lost close to 37 000 men in just trying to land along over a quarter of his armoured forces and his men had only just set up a base out of the city because of there blasted AA defence and there orbital guns he had lost seven of them before he decided against sending more. _''Who puts anti-star vessel guns on a tank these people are insane. ''_ Seen that the fifth wave was going in now he smiled soon they would fall. ''Alert the eclipse and blood pack to go in with the next wave they will lead the charge. _''The less of them left the less I have of them I have to deal with later.''_

''What is the status of the reinforcement fleet that is on its way.''

''Sir the reinforcement fleet is only a day out and should restore roughly half our losses but they have no heavy ship's with them.''

''Good I think these new slaves are going to be a boon for the Hegemony after we take this planet we will move to there home world I doubt they can stand against our full might.''

 **Saren Arterius**

He looked out towards the forest in which the Batarians had landed in hearing the sound of allied artillery hammering into there forces, Looking at the humans that were pulling out of the forest they looked like hell the majority of them sporting wounds along with there dead. He looked at his unit the youngest of them at only been 19 one of the youngest to ever be assigned to a Blackwatch division.

''These humans are dangerous they don't let up on the Batarians if they were not so much like the Asari I might have thought they were Krogan.'' States one of his comrades.

''There worse than the Krogan at least with Krogan you know to expect them to charge at you, then you don't know what the hell there planing. I mean we were near the space-port we had them contained but instead of holding onto it the second we were been pushed back they pulled out and blew it, who else do you know would do something like that?.''

''LOOK ALIVE!.'' Bellowed a human over the channel.

''Finally, we get some action these humans have been doing our job let's show them how we Turians fight.''

The sound of Machine Guns and sniper rifles come to Sarens ears. He looks through his scope preparing to scope a Batarian in simple grey armor when his head jerks back the left side of his face missing. _''What in the world do these humans use for ammo no wonder they keep beating back and why they don't seem to have an issue with Krogan if all their weapons are tearing them apart like that.''_

''AIR STRIKE! Inbound get to cover.'' Shouts one of his fellow Blackwatch

A Batarian strike-craft one of the few that had not been in the fight in space began a strafing run on their location only for a human to pull out a strange object and aims it at the Batarian Strike-craft. Moments later the Batarian strike-craft is on flames and on a decent course directly to one of the few HMG nests on his line.

The Strike-craft gauges earth as it crashes and landing practically on top of the HMG Followed by an explosion. A Human medic runs to the crash site and begins to pull out the injured Saren stares as a Human who is pulled out his legs missing leaking a red substance he assumes to be his blood his remaining legs mangled with some flesh hanging a strewn across the floor .looking back to forest he sees Batarians and blood pack mercenaries charging their lines. He aims his Phaeston and fires breaking the barriers of a Krogan who is charging him only to be knocked off his feet by an explosion.

''There breaking through all forces pull back to the second defense line.'' Comes an order over the channel

''Why the hell are we pulling back do these humans not have the backbone to hold for just one moment.'' States a centurion

''It;s Called laying a bloody trap now get your asses into gear before the artillery starts to land on our heads.''states a grizzled human who has a scar around his eye and two different eye colours, and for your information these bastards are pathetic I remember the bloody rebels putting up a better fight than this.''

Before Saren can comment his commanding officer gets a hold on him and pushes him into one of the human vehicles. ''Follow your Orders soldier were just here to support them not question their Tactics.''

The sound of more artillery fire followed by the sound of explosions and the cries of dying Batarians as the door closes taking him to the next line.

''I don't understand we're supposed to protect the city when you defend it yet these Humans.''He shudders.'' There blowing up everything that has been built here why bother to protect it. Before one of his fellow Turians can comment a human in the vehicle with them looks at him and shakes his head.

 **Commander David Anderson**

He was using his tactical cloak to move around the forest to the Batarians base his mission was simple they said to his squad. _''This is anything but simple, they said I just had to sneak into the base and plant the explosives through the second objective would be the bigger issue. I can easily sneak through anything but how the hell am I supposed to free any of the slaves they bring them down, they did say only if I could but even the General looked conflicted when he gave the order for following that one I mean what is twelve of us supposed to do against an army if we do find slaves.''_

Slowly looking around avoiding yet another patrol he slowly makes his way towards the base. Half an hour later they came across a base were a large vehicle pool and prefab building was along with what he assumed were their supplies. ''Looks like we found it now we just got to set the charges and we should look for information for the general.''

''Agreed Captain Urban, just do us all a favor and not get shot this time I think your wife will kill us I swear that women could kill us with her stare.''

''Ya sure coming from the man who is dating a High Admirals daughter and one with a reputation has been as cold as the vacuum of space when involving her family, I find it hard to believe that my wife's stare is more unnerving to deal with.''

''Clear the channel we don't have time for this with all these hostiles.'' States Anderson

Moving around the camp the N7 squad deployed their explosives to what they assume are munitions and key equipment they also plant charges on armor and vehicles that have been left unsupervised. Half an hour passes for them as they continue there mission when they come across a large Structure they assume to be a storage building. They sneak in and find a large heavy weapons cache which is quickly set to blow. ''We got incoming.''

''Shit any chance you can remove him.'' States Anderson while taking cover behind a bunch of boxes. As he looks through his helmets display system to see what his squad mate is looking at.

''Negative, Boss looks like he has a friend with him but this one not like the other's looks like it's female and is wearing a full suit think it is one of those Quarians that they might have had with them that the Dino's Showed us.''

The Batarian gets to the doorway and looks back towards the female. ''Get a move on your piece of crap, you have a job to do.'' He says as he brings up his Omni-tool and presses a button that causes the Quarian to jolt.

They both enter and walk over to a weapons table as the unknown begins to work while the Batarian keeps an eye on her. ''You suit rats are all the same you complain too much but you are easy-to-''

He fails to notice as a knife enters the back of his neck and is pulled behind a crate while the Quarian sharply turns around and begins to back away from the strange aliens in fear, she says something in her language which the squad doesn't understand.

Anderson quickly gives the order to secure the perimeter while he brings his Omni-tool up and brings up his translator and has it translate to Turian. ''Ma'am we don't know what your saying please speak Turian and we aren't going to hurt you.''

The Quarian looked to her Omni-tool and began to type furiously into it, a few seconds later it beeped and had a small glowing ball picture. ''Thank you for helping me I am sure I can repay you if you get me out of here,'' she says as the program translates what she says.

''That's okay Ma'am my names David Anderson may I know yours?.'' He asks not sounding sure and looking a little uncomfortable.

''Oh sorry my name is Mina'Zorah nar Rayya.'' She says as while fiddling with her suit and looking around.

Anderson nods and checks if anything is on sensors. _''That is one long name.''_

''Okay Ma'am we were just doing our mission but can you tell us where the other's are been held?''

Her head tilted to the side and she began to look everywhere but at them. ''They were holding us in one of the there ships but I don't know which one that's all I know, they only ever take us out of the cells when they need us for something.

''Okay just follow us and stay hidden were going to see if we can do something but we cannot guarantee anything.'' He says while beginning to move away as a transmission come in

''This is Cooper we have dropships inbound, we have to get out of here we won't be able to get out unnoticed with the amount of activity that's about to land here.'' He says in a hurried tone.

''Understood, were pulling out, Urban you are escorting Rayya out of here while the rest of us ensure that the explosives we set go off.''

''Yes sir,'' he answers slightly hesitant as he closes in near the Quarian to ensure her safety.

The next few minutes are tense with a lot of diving for cover or using their tactical cloaks to sneak around and set the last of the explosives.

 **Captain Urban**

Slowly looking around he notices another patrol and gestures for the alien that is following him to lay low. _''What the hell is the commander thinking to leave me to guard an alien by myself, If these bastards find us I am so screwed.''_ looking back above the crate he sees that the guards are busy checking the buildings opposite of him , He signals for her to follow him while making his way to the next tank which is close to the forest, He breaths a sigh of relief that they were not detected. He looks back into the encampment and notices that the patrol from earlier is heading for the building as they had killed the Batarian.

''Commander you might be going loud soon so be ready there's a patrol that just went into that building we left the dead Bastard.'' He looks around and sees that there are no nearby patrols or groupings of them. He looks to the Quarian and nods. ''We're gonna get out of here before things get hot but it is a bit of a run till we're clear you stay down and out of sight should something happen.'' He takes out his pistol and flips it around and offers her the handle. ''I assume you know how to use this so should we get engaged well better make yourself useful because otherwise we are fucked.''

Mina nods her head and takes the gun and notices that it does not fit nicely and just shakes her head. ''All of my people are trained for things like this, Though this thing feels rather bulky and heavier than our standard weapons.

The two of them begin to run for the forest they are about three-fourths of the way till there out of sight when they here shout's start emanating from the building that the patrol went into, looking back he notices that the patrol failed to notice them and is currently heading towards the main squad location,

''Anderson you got incoming on your AO so you better hall ass otherwise this is gonna get hot very fast and you guys are still in the blast zone.''

''We know Captain just get out of here, for now, we will see you back at base.''

They make it to the forest without issues and begin the long run back to safety in silence it is only eight minutes before an earth-shattering BOOM! Is heard with a massive heat wave from the location of the weapons depot, looking back Urban notices a giant dust cloud with a strange blue hue combined with it.

''Commander you still there and, what the hell did we just blow up I know that C12 is not that explosive and an ammo depot should not have such a large explosion.''

''Ya were still here though that explosion nearly got us Cooper took the worst of it but he is fine nothing serious, I do know however that these bastards are definitely regretting fighting us now that must have been a good portion of the ground vehicles, but right now we are still in hostile territory so we can talk later lets get our asses home.''

 **Centurion Lucia Falraka**

Firing her Phaeston at the advancing Batarians from the third story of a building she was in with seven other Humans, She had been separated from the rest of her unit when the Batarians had used a mass wave of tanks to break through. Chuckling at the memory of seen the Batarians faces when they were destroyed at the time she had been dumbstruck herself at how easy the tanks were dispatched, looking down at the street with the blood of the fallen and a now burning wreckage of the tanks that were recently destroyed. Shaking her head as She turns around and walks over to whom she assumes is the leader of this squad. While trying to block out the sounds of the heavy artillery battering the Batarian lines.

''You the one in charge sir.''

The man she looks at has strange her around his mouth and his face heavily scarred and has two different eye colors and is leaning against a counter and nods his.''Ya I'm the guy in charge of this squad let me guess you got cut from your unit when we were pulling out, well no worries you can stick with us till you regroup with your guys, It won't even belong because this was the second last line which means the General will put the plan into motion soon and then we can really start to kick these guys off our turf, till then we're gonna be running hit and runs to disorganize the bastards.

''We got another group down the road sir and we have contact with three other squads in the nearby buildings, orders sir.''

''Well breaks over ladies get your asses into gear and take a position we gonna hit the Bastards right in the kisser while they in between us, so were are the others?''

''Sir! The others are just across from us one building over to the right and the other squad is down the road with a clear view of the main advance.''

''Good, now we wait for em we launch the ambush on my signal.''

The sound of hover tanks and marching of the enemies fills her ears as they close in, she Fidel with her Phaeston while shifting a little as they get closer. Looking into the street while in cover been careful not to give away her position, she sees a large amount of infantry with a column of tanks in their center. _''What the Spirits! are these people thinking there is a way too many down there for our three squads to deal with quickly and we don't even have tanks I am starting to agree with some of those rumors I heard from the others.''_ The sounds of the battlefield seem to disappear as she waits and it feels as if an eternity while waiting for the order to begin.

'' **NOW!.** '' barks the squad leader as he along with three others leave there cover large tube-like weapons, aiming at the vehicles

A simple push of the button release there payload destroying the coulomb two in the front one in the back while one missile was slightly off target hitting a Krogan that was with the group, The Vehicles are left smouldering ruins while the Krogan remains alive his lower half missing his entrails slowly falling out as he crawls backwards to cover. The next moment strange bottles with a flame on the top of them come falling out on the groups from the other buildings and lands amid the confused Slavers. Coating them in a fiery inferno, the sounds of screams of agony rise as the sounds of gunfire fills her ears.

She shoulders her Phaeston and sights a Batarian running for cover and quickly eliminates him, this happens in an instant as quickly as the fight began it is over, looking over the destruction she had helped cause she notices that the majority of the dead are either burning alive or are mutilated beyond what she thought was possible for normal small arms. Feeling sick to her stomach as she realizes that there are still a few Batarians are burning she raises her rifle to finish them off when a hand enters her peripheral vision pulling her shoulder bringing her face to face the leader.

''DID YOU NOT HEAR ME WE ARE MOVING OUT SO GET YOUR ASS IN GEAR WE DONT HAVE TIME TO WASTE!.'' Red in the face as he says this, he turns around a begins to walk away.

''She begins to follow him, the sound of burning Batarians filling her ears trying to get over the horrific sight that the human weapons could cause. As they enter the street at a jogging pace she notices that some of the squad have lifted the corpses of a few Batarians and leaving their grenades underneath them while others are laying strange packs with a strange beam left behind them. Looking to the sky as her group begins the trek back to there base she notices that the sun is almost below the horizon.

The way back to the main front line is filled with multiple skirmishes and ambushes that were set up by the Humans and the regrouping of the forces that had been cut-off. Nearing the front lines she notices that some of the bodies are using armor of both the eclipse and blood pack mercenary company. ''This is interesting never would have thought that the mercs were actually slavers as well.'' She says aloud gaining the attention of the nearby Humans

''HA, you say these are mercenaries looks like they got thrown into the meat grinder to me, they may have well have sent kittens to do the job because some of the reports I have from the others indicate these are no better than FNG's out of basic.'' chuckling breaks out among the assembled group of soldiers.''

The rest of the trip back to the front lines is quiet with a lot of twists and hiding.

The front lines become clear when the sound of weapons discharge is constant the squad fans out and disperses into the buildings right behind the Batarian backs.

''This is the plan men were going to get right on top of them so stealth kills only till my signal you get seen I'm gonna roast your ass if you're still alive, make it happen marines.''

Lucia sneaks up behind a Batarian currently using a window for cover to focused to even see her, pulling out the Large knife a young human gave her earlier, raising it in a reverse grip and brings it down hard into the Batarians skull, he immediately goes slack and begins to fall to the floor only stopped when he is grabbed and lowered slowly, pulling the knife out it makes an audible, shplort! She wipes the blade that is covered in a red and small amount of grey clean and brings her Phaeston to the ready.

Artillery land's near her location sending dirt and rubble all around, the shock-waves destabilizing her. _"I swear to the spirits that this is the last time I join a Human squad never thought I would be a doing so many different tactics, at least command will know that humans fight in such strange tactics should they ever become an issue."_ The commander makes a signal with his hand's that she doesn't notice. Minutes pass and a rumble in the air is heard, she sees a strange vehicle with treads and a main gun that was at least three times the size of the standard Turian tanks with a strange turreted box on the back of it that was moving around pointing to the air. Moving towards her from the human lines, her eyes dilate at the sight of the monstrosity as it begins to move and aim its weapon towards a Batarian tank that is in the lead of large charge of Batarians.

 **Field Commander Galek**

Field Commander Galek in charge of the Batarian Hegemony's 87th infantry company. He stood around the corner of one of three different offensives trying to push further into the hostile lines. Currently, his Omni-tool was been used to show orbital pictures of the upcoming terrain. He was covered in soot and scorch marks with pieces of his left side armor was missing replaced by some bandage from a near strike artillery shell during his landing.

''GALEK!.'' shouts Admiral Porvan venom clear in his tone ''I want to know what is taking you so long to beat down these primitives? And where are the slaves I have yet to receive a single transport of them.''

He replies with a slight growl and barely restrained rage in his ''These, Primitives, As you call them have been putting up too much resistance and they refuse to surrender they just die, they are more stubborn than Krogan when it comes to giving up and my forces have been getting decimated throughout this entire assault, what I want to know is where is my cursed orbital support to crush them!.''

''Do your Job Galek and I will do mine and it is because of your lack of success in destroying those tanks that you lack what you require along with the fact that since you have failed to deliver on the goods that we can't risk bombardment, you have two day's left before I am pulling out so get to work.'' He snidely says as his transmission cuts offensives

''That's it third platoon your with me these pathetic pyjacks don't know how to break through a simple defense position let's show them how we do it. FOR THE HEGEMONY!

He goes around the corner followed by what is left of the third platoon along with the remains of his armor detachment leading the Charge. Firing his weapon from the hip, they retaliate with there own fire tearing apart his left flank, he dives for cover as the man behind him is torn apart by gunfire. ''Take cover behind the tanks they can handle the fire!''

He advances behind the lead tank, the next moment an earth-shattering BOOM! Is heard, he feels weightless and light headed. He impacts the Ground with an audible thump the air in his gut leaving him. He turns his head towards the enemy and sees his vehicle in flame's and further ahead a group of vehicles he had never seen before.

He tries to stand only for his body to not respond looking down he notices that He no longer has half a body, his guts draped across the road the last thing he sees is the windows above him light up and there vehicles pushing them back, he hears nothing his last thoughts of how could they have beat the Hegemony.


	5. Chapter 5-War is hell

**Admiral Porvan**

He stood aboard the newly arrived Decimation a Decapitator class Dreadnought the strongest vessel the Hegemony had to date, which was currently on loan to his fleet encase they had issues with there planned raid and had been attached encase of possible issues. That was until this new race showed up, now he would use it to launch another strike at the next colony under the orders of the Hegemony, Even if he could see clearly that he was under strength with his current losses. Porvan could only go through his tactical display with so little going on in space, his annoyance with General Galak had only grown with his incompetence his ground forces were reporting close to 70% of all his deployed forces to be either combat ineffective or dead. It did not help that close to all of his armored vehicles that were carried in the fleet were already destroyed because of these upstarts attacks on his supply depot on the ground was wiped out. He began to move to around the bridge surveying all of the information that was coming in he was now going through it after his talk with Galak and his lack of progress. He noticed something his XO was holding a data-pad and was continuously looking through it not doing his job of keeping an eye on the rabble he was dressed in and multicolored armor of red and green that showed his status off.

''What is going on that you seem to be so panicked Bazec.'' He states with venom clear in his voice at the displeasure of his people been so pathetic.

''Admiral... I went through our reserve forces, we have already deployed them, I was considering that we send the slaves to break there line's.'' He says confidently only a small amount of fear is seen in his eyes.

''No, we have the required men and I will not waste our stocks just to do the job's, and since we lack any return on these natives we would only make a loss.'' He says Snidely at him annoyed about not receiving any slaves and their losses.

Looking back to his tactical table he sees that the fleet is nicely stacked over the planet out of range of the orbital guns, and to ensure that any reinforcement fleet that they could only hit him from a certain angle, nodding he looked over his current fleet while not as large as his previous armada he was confident that it would be able to do the job, with the arrival of his new dreadnought and 30 more like them along with 300 more cruisers and there 700 frigates to escort them. He smiled it seemed the Hegemony had given him nearly two-fifths of an entire fleet. to bulk his forces and there accompanying ground forces along with the majority of the raids forces meant for capturing his targets, were only a day out he would be able to truly show their superiority to these pathetic primitives he mused if only he had ordered all of the transports through this would have been over much sooner.

He began to move towards his quarters as he was sure Galak could handle breaking this last line, of defense against such a weak force that held the line. He smiled yes he could celebrate early he was completely certain that the Hegemony would break their backs. He took the elevator to enjoy his Asari slave a large murderous grin upon his face.

 **The Artemis Destroyer ORCA**

Captain Kyle of the SSV ORCA had just arrived over the planet and was currently hiding among the enemy fleet taking orbital control of the colony. The entire crew was dressed in there armor in helmets attached to there sides in the event of been discovered they were all either jet black or a dark cobalt blue. Everyone was going over there sensors diligently while they were in the process of ensuring that they would not be detected when they got a hold of General Williams.

Sweat was evident across the captains head as he tried to remain calm surrounded by so many combatants, he was confident that if they were discovered that they could warp out in time. Looking around his entire crew were showing signs of extreme anxiety then again who could be calm among so many hostile ships.

''Sir we are managing to get a secure connection but I would suggest that we not keep the line open to long unless we want to end up on the firing line.'' Roland the AI says dressed in Ninja garments.

He nods and begins to head to the communications since the ship was running silent. ''General Williams are you reading me this is Captain Kyle of the Artemis Destroyer.'' He calls out confidently.

''This is General Williams I'm so glad to hear your there Orca what is the status of our reinforcements and the defense fleet, and is it possible for you to get us some damned intelligence the few satellites we had were wiped out in the first engagement.'' His voice hard with hints of relief.

A smile tugs to the captains face hearing that they were still operating down on the planet. ''The status of reinforcements is still on schedule and the defense fleet with our friends are currently getting a few things sorted out, and we will be on station to provide you with what is required we are going silent to gather your information we will send it ASAP.'' He says calmly. As he cut the communications

''Okay people our guys on the ground seem to be holding out now let's give them a hand.'' He orders sternly.

 **Tank Commander Erwin**

Commander looked down at his tanks tactical computer giving him the general locations of all the forces. Looking at the High definition screens showing the exterior of the vehicle, he could see the defense line was currently hammering into the advancing force. He came around the corner and saw a tank column advancing with there infantry using them for cover.

''Load Sabot and fire on lead vehicle wolverine 2 same target.'' He orders.

The first round takes out the advancing MBT shields and pushing it back while denting the armor, while the second shot takes the tank out of commission and the following infantry are torn apart by them.

''This is Wolverine lead, Dual sabot shot to be effective fire for effect, on incoming armor pick your targets weapons free.'' He orders a small amount of confidence leaking through over the Armour company channel.

They begin there advance through the city slaughtering anything they come across, while the Alpha Platoon takes a high-speed route to there flanks the tank core advances with limited resistance. There tank shields holding while the IFV is showing signs of mounting damage.

''This is Leopard three we have to pull out can't take much more of this.'' The IFV begins to reverse only to take a rocket to the rear knocking out the engine block.

''AMBUSH LEFT'' Shouts the commander

the tanks near it quickly reverse and surround the damaged IFV to protect the crew while Wolverine 4 and 1 open up on the building with there weapons kicking up a wave of dust and rubble.

The IFV is hooked up to another one and towed back while the rest of the task force advance towards the edge of the city while sweeping it out to secure their forward positions with Alpha Platoon.

''This is spearhead seven task force we are under-way to Alpha main line has been breached we are free for orders please advise command.''

 **Lieutenant Trever Everett**

He was currently in a fresh pair of armor his previous set fried from a nearby explosive, his face carrying a small bandage over his right cheek. He was currently seated in one of the Pumas been launched in the counter-attack now that command had deemed the hostile forces locations acceptable.

Looking around at the dimly lit cabin of two different combined squads all showing a slight amount of fatigue and mired by a few injuries or scorch marks or damaged armor his grey eyes locking with his lifelong friend and offering a half-hearted smile trying to calm both his and her nerves.

''Okay listen up the offensive is about to begin you guys are going to be taking the most direct root, and cut off there retreat you have two Apocalypse tanks attached to your unit so keep them safe, you are the advance force so good luck.'' Shouts the General over Alpha platoons channel.

The sound of the of the puma rumbling to life, he could feel it accelerating it doesn't take long before he hears the sound of both, apocalypse tanks and pumas main guns firing alongside the co axles. It only takes a few minutes before they come to a stop but it feels like an eternity.

''Alpha Platoon disembark you know your orders let get it done marines!'' Barks the Major

disembarking his ears here the sound of small arms in the distance as the city is encompassed in a fiery orange haze, while large numbers of marines alongside him are moving in perfect order to set up locations on the incoming forces.

''This is intense I wonder where their forces are. and I wonder did we really push that far in or did they just not bother to leave any reserves.'' came the astonished voice of a male private.

''they will be here soon enough get your ass in gear marines sat scan shows we got at, least half of what's left of the landing forces inbound the real fight starts now.'' Comes the major's voice over the channel.

He takes position inside one of the former foxholes in a good sniping spot, only to find a corpse of a former Marine his gut completely blowing out.

''What the fuck happened to him.'' came the scared voice of one of his marines the rest of his squad also showing signs of discomfort at the site.

'' He's dead, get that body out there and collect his tags before we got more hostiles on top of us, It's do or die, people, we can grieve our dead after we make these bastards pay.'' He says in a cold voice giving away no emotion.

He crouches down and sets his post up while looking around the sounds of vehicles engaging throughout the city.

''Take cover the bastards set up a artillery inside the city.'' Shouts the major as he dives for a foxhole.

The entire squad along with all surrounding units hit the deck taking cover in foxholes or small ditches to avoid shrapnel.

''Shit! When the hell did they set up heavies.'' Screams a private folding in on himself in the foxhole.

The artillery barrage does not let up but fails to connect with much of alpha platoon and continues, a call to alert everyone to there sensors because they are picking up movement up ahead. Looking over the edge of his cover he notices that the Batarians are charging them.

''Positive on Hostile s Engaging!.'' Shouts the Lieutenant as he begins to fire into the hostiles as they move to cover and make a slow advance, his comrades join him in keeping them back making there shot's count, as their armour goes weapons free causing the hostiles to pull back a bit to avoid been completely obliterated, Artillery continues to blast away at the position not giving them any rest. The only sound that resonates along the line is weapons fire been traded and explosions and calls for a corpsman.

 **Centurion Lucia**

Advancing with what remained of the Blackwatch platoon of only 17 others, looking around she saw that most of there armour was damaged or scorched from explosions and glancing blows, They were attached to the specialist squads that were currently advancing on the location of the artillery, they were making good headway sneaking around the backs of the Batarians, it didn't help that the last report that came in had the front lines so screwed up because of all the different pockets of resistance, on both sides they had already been engaged five times before. Running and keeping low they enter a building and reform only a few clicks out, they fan out to take out overwatch while she moves to discuss the plans to take out the threat.

''What's the plan of attack now that we are only two blocks out,'' she asks her voice hard and low.

He looks at her contemplating their moves before he answers. ''The plan is simple from what we managed to gather they still hold all possible routes to get to the guns, which mean we're going to have to punch through, time is of the essence Alpha is taking heavy fire but if we rush this they are going to fall if we engage, chances are that their artillery is going to focus on us to protect them, so I suggest we spread out into three teams dividing what left of our three platoons into strike teams, we hit the same time which should reduce the risk of us been wiped out by a bombardment, also General Williams says we have artillery about to begin a counter-barrage the Juggernauts are moving into position once they begin I think that would be the best time to begin the assault.'' He says sounding tired.

She nods her head and moves towards were her platoon who were holding down the stairs and the nearby windows, when one of them see her approaching he says something and the squad leader who was watching the stairs switches out and moves towards her.

''Orders Ma'am,''Juvus asks an impatient tinge in his harmonics while his stance is rigid.

''Yes, we will be moving out in a bit the assault will happen once we have artillery support and we're going to be pushing up the right flank it would seem.'' She confidently remarks while taking in his appearance, his armor was scorched in multiple locations with shrapnel sticking out of it on his one pauldron. ''What has you so worried Juvus that you are been so aggressive.'' She orders firmly

''It's just. I don't like how were following orders from these people I will admit there good but if we had just engaged them and held the line then none of this would have happened.'' He says angrily while glaring at the humans.

She immediately signals for him to follow her while she begins to move to a more secluded area in the building the moment she thinks she is out of range of her squad and the humans she rounds on him a Turian Glare been directed at him.

''You are to get a hold of your emotions and not complain, we were given an order we do not question it, while they fight differently than us can you be so short sited that you fail, to see what damage we have done to these pirates, I will put it down for you simply they have overextended and pushed so far that they are now surrounded, and been wiped out if we had held the line we would have been beating each other for days, they have wiped out so many of them in quick succession that I can only applaud them on it, also you can not cause a diplomatic incident at such a critical time. The majority of our forces that have landed have only been impressed and gained a lot of respect from the commanders, I would also like to point out that I really don't want to engage these people they have more ferocity than Krogan, I have seen their weapons tear apart both Batarian and Krogan apart with there guns and their tactics, are dangerous and quick to adapt we must tread carefully.'' She says sternly only to slowly change to fear. The images of a Krogan that was blowing in half his guts flying across the street only for it to be replace by the screams of burning Batarians. She shakes her head Juvus fails to notice the small panic attack.

''We just have to survive and follow our orders Juvus nothing else,'' she says quietly making her way back to the squad.

 **Sargent Juvus**

''We're moving out,'' orders Lucia while following fire team 1

He moved just behind her keeping constantly looking for new hostiles they enter the street, and begin to move to the right-hand side of the road while moving low to the ground, the sounds of battle all around them in the distance it is only a few minutes till they arrive, just outside the Batarians artillery line. He takes cover behind a vehicle they all lay low as he watches them.

 _''This is Sargent Farlow requesting artillery barrage on grid 17E targets are designated''_ Comes the voice of a nearby human over the local channel.

 _''Roger!. Redirect as required t-minus 20 seconds''_ The voice of a calmly answers.

The sound of artillery is barely heard over the surrounding areas noise, the surrounding sound is broken by a high pitch whistle closing in on his position, he crouches lower behind his cover.

BOOM, BOOM, BOOM,! Followed by more shells it continues to for what seems to be forever, he feels the ground shake beneath him the heat wave felt making him uncomfortable, looking over cover he sees that the entire defensive line is damaged all over the street.

 _''Fire mission successful thanks for the hand standby for further instructions.''_ the calm and slightly enthusiastic voice comes over the channel.

''Okay people advance we have our opening, weapons free!'' Shouts Lucia the sounds of weapons fire fills his ears.

They advance keeping a firm advance on them as the sun begins to rise at there backs, a long night of fighting past only for it to continue there advance is met with firm resistance, only to fall to well placed weapons fire or support fire they advance until they reach just a block away from the artillery, he sees it slowly turning towards them and a heavy defence line is set up but scattered.

''This is the final push men keep up the pressure, the other assault teams are a few minutes away.'' Shouts Lucia over the channel it been slightly distorted.

They advance and slowly become to a standstill they continue to trade fire, the next second one of his fellow Blackwatch head jerks back after his barriers fail from a single shot his lower leg jerking slightly just after.

''SNIPER'' He shouts as he dives back into cover only for around to pass where he was just standing, he looks to his right and sees The youngest of his group.

''You good with that sniper?'' He asks taking deep breaths while firing blindly over cover waiting for his shields.

''Yes sir.'' He responds confidently while throwing a grenade to flush more of them out, only for a heavy explosion to land a few meters behind there advance.

''Good we gotta advance and that sniper is an issue so I'm gonna draw his fire this is up to you.'' Steel in his voice

Saren nods, He moves to the edge of his cover and nods to Saren he raises his hand and waits, he hears a crack of the sniper again and takes a step out of his cover aiming at the sniper and firing, a HMG locks onto him and opens fire on him while the sniper shoots him at the same time the last thing, he sees is the snipers head jerk back as he feels bullets tear into him.

 **Saren Arterius**

He was currently behind a crashed shuttle artillery was raining on his position from the last Batarian forces in the area. He was currently covered head to toe in dirt and burn marks his left arm aching from a ricochet.

''Advance there nearly on top of us!.'' shouts Lucia while blind firing over her cover.

Saren pulls around the corner taking aim and firing into the Batarian line's only to be knocked off his feet and flung into the open, dazed he only sees black his ears ringing the sounds of distant gunfire only heard over ringing. He tries to move only for nothing to respond, he starts to regain his senses, he feels hands under his shoulders pulling him. He tries to speak only for it come out garbled and incoherent.

''Hang in there sol-.'' comes an unknown voice distantly

the sounds of vehicles passing by only to fade out to ringing, time seems to vary sounds going in and out of focus slowly becoming more focused as time goes only able to make out certain sentences as time goes on.

''The counter-offensive is-'' he hears only for it to fade out again

he is laid onto something he doesn't know his hearing starting to become more lucid.

''What happened to him.'' came the voice of a Turian medic.

''Artillery shell landed on his position he was pulled out of some rubble a little while ago by his CO we did the best we could but his entire armor is locked up and his bio-metric reader is fried.'' came the familiar voice of Acvia sounding tired.

''Understood you take a seat there so I can look at you next your only looking slightly better than him.'' the nurse says professionally concern heard in a small amount of sub-harmonics.

The sound of others being treated are heard all around him while he feels his armor been pried apart, his helmet finally comes off and light flood's his senses seen a sterile white roof with a female Turian hovering over him.

''Good his conscious that's means it's not as bad as I feared can you talk?'' she looks at him kindly

Trying to speak but it still comes out as a gurgle, and the nurse recognises the issue as well as looking at his now revealed arm she prepares a anaesthetic to put him out as he is given an injection, as he slowly loses conscious he notices that his one arm is mangled and completely chard it's plates missing and some bone easily seen.

 **Lieutenant Trever Everett**

''We got more inbound there relentless, guess we know what it feels like to deal with the Soviets from the world war.'' He says to his squad and notices them gaining his face set in determination while he returns fire.

''Keep up the fire before they reach us.'' He shouts over the comm's while taking cover behind the remaining sandbags.

The sound of HMG's and the tanks and IFV's increase in speed and ferocity his ears ringing the smell of blood metal and explosives his throat constricted trying to keep the bile from rising up from all the shock waves of the artillery that was firing on them earlier looking over his cover. He fires at the advancing forces only to dive back into cover when his barriers flare up. The squad continues to fire without fail feeling like an eternity as the advancing forces continue to walk over there fallen, he goes for a magazine only to come up empty.

''I'm out I need a MAG,'' he shouts to the surrounding soldiers.

''Here sir it one of my last make em count.'' Says shadow the squad's infiltrator as she holds up her last MAG.

He nods and reloads his gun and takes single shot, he begins to hear call for more ammo knowing that there almost out, a good portion of the line begins to use their secondary and it holds them back, for a few minutes as more of the platoon starts to switch over to there hold out pistols which start to cause their barriers to activate.

''There getting close now boys fix Bayonets!.'' Shouts the major doing just what he said while taking cover

''Is he Insane.'' exclaims one of the privates his statement mirrored on a few of the faces on the surrounding soldiers.

''No he ain't were out of ammo we have to take the fight to them if we want any chance seen the end of this.'' He says confidently while fixing his bayonet.

The air is tense as they hear the advancing forces moving further to deal with them his breathing deep, he hears the rumble of long-range guns and explosions hit the rear and center of the advancing line.

''CHARGE!'' Bellows the Major and he along with the entire line spring out of there cover charging them shocking the Batarians momentarily, but that is all they need as bayonets sink into them completely decimating their front line. He stabs his knife through the neck of a Batarian only to pull it out and sweep it to the right and cutting another ones arm off and then finishing him off, more come and he fights aside his men the sounds of blades cutting through armor and flesh as they continue the offensive.

The fight continues as each side cuts one another down soon the battle is over, as their reinforcements arrive the dead litter all over the plaza, He is covered in blood as it slowly drips off his armour and weapon he sees that there are Turians both from alpha platoon and the reinforcements all in shock at the brutality of the CQC that they had just witnessed.

 **Commander Irene Of heavy infantry company Anubis**

The Heavy infantry company was split into four different assault teams clearing out the city. They marched through the rubble and body filled streets the sounds of sporadic gunfire filling the sensors, they marched in perfect unison while they crushed any hostilities in rapid succession Music blaring **(Hell march)** as they cleared out of what remained.

''This wasn't fair why did the general only let us out to play now!'' Whines Irene over half the company agrees with her some voicing their agreement.

''Look on the bright side we know that there is more coming, the General said that he had a special assignment for us once this objective is done.'' States one of her companions sounding enthusiastic.

Irene nods ''Your right maybe we are in for a treat I guess only time will tell.''

They continued there path of destruction obliterating anything they ran into. By half day all fighting in the city was over a city of rubble all that remained.

 **General Williams**

He sat in his office surrounded by operators giving out his orders the bunker smelt of palm trees in the summer, He was currently going over the reports from the counter-offensive and noticed that all hostile forces were no longer in a cohesive force, and were just holdouts and nodded proudly of what his forces had accomplished, He knew that while they had only repulsed the arriving forces, he was sure that the worst was yet to come, He signed this was going to be a long few days until the fleet arrived until then, he had given orders to reinforce the city and he had pulled the militia to reinforce the inner city with traps and lay in wait. The outer city had become layers of trenches and minefields while the heavy infantry had dug into the forest, waiting for the next wave because the coming battle would truly test him he had already lost close to 30% combat effectiveness, he assumed it would have been worse had it not been for there shields working he had only lost 3 % of all the casualties were KIA. Looking over the plans he could only hope.

''General you should get some rest before the next wave we can't have you out of commission.'' Came the concerned voice of Irene her holo avatar looking at him.

He nods and begins to head for his Quarters thoughts of the upcoming battle his only focus.

 **Admiral Porvan**

He was currently in the command center filled with his officers and was in a rage and had already shot two slaves, and injured one of his men his face etched in a deep scowl. ''DID they manage to destroy their orbital defenses!.'' He yells at his command staff.

A trembling officer tried to speak but was cut off by his rant.

''Of course not you are all worthless pieces of crap, command put me in charge of pirates that are incompetent fools incapable of doing anything once the true army arrives we will deal with these Primitives.'' He howls out.

He grabs a data pad and throws it at a display of the planet breathing deeply. ''Leave me I have to plan.'' He moves to his chair and sits his face contorted in anger, his fist under his chin while looking at a display of the planet.

 **Codex**

 **Juggernaut G13 SPG:**

Armament:210mm Howitzer MAC Cannon and 4 0.50cal machine gun's and has a single AA missile emplacement attached to the rear of the vehicle

 **Protection:** has 4.5cm of Titanium-B battle-plate in all directions and has an energy shield

Speed:117Km/H

 **Summary:** The Juggernaut G13 SPG is the replacement of the Juggernaut G12 SPG and was introduced in the year of 2217 and is considered one of the most mobile pieces of artillery, of the alliance arsenal capable of an effective range of up to 115 km with a fire rate of up to 15 rounds a minute and has 8 AA missiles for defence.

 **The military refit of 2255:**

The Military refit of 2255 was the decision that all naval and planetary vehicles were to be given the new energy shielding to faze out the older kinetic barriers, used on smaller vehicles and the void navy vessels by the time of first contact only the first, second and fifth fleets had completed the full retrofit with fresh vehicles, while the outer colonies were still using the older versions it was planned to be finished upon the year of 2263, with all planetary vehicles been only retrofitted in the last three years. After first contact it was decided that the retrofit was of utmost importance, and would finish four years ahead of schedule, this had the unintended effect of allowing piracy to become an issue in the southeastern sectors of the alliance and would take three years of active hunting to break all strongholds that would be established.

 **Military Tactical Knife:** Model d after the old Rambo Hunting Knife to give it both a practical and dangerous edge to anyone fighting in CQC, all of which are Monomolecular blades to ensure a kill.

 **AI combat platforms:** All Ai combat platforms are equipped with energy shields along with heavy weapons, ranging from a Minigun or heavy HMG to a shoulder-mounted mortar or rocket launcher allowing for them to deal with almost any threat.


	6. Chapter 6-Calm before the storm

**Admiral Shepard Aboard the NOMAD Colossus Class Packer**

She was currently sitting on the edge of her bed in her quarters the lights set to give off almost no light only illuminating the room slightly. Her black hair tied back in a ponytail while she went over the data, that was received her green eyes sharply focused, looking over the information sent from both the ORCA and the VIXEN, they had lost contact after the last report which was grating the fleets nerves.

The data-pad currently had images of the fleet over the planet and was focused on the multiple Battle-cruisers in the centre, bringing up the analysis of the ships capabilities showing that they were marked as a moderate threat, which were geared to the destruction of the lighter vessels in her fleet while all the other ships were marked as low-level threats. This coupled with the reports that said they had near non-existent point defenses, had caused a great deal of stress to be relieved her for the upcoming battle, knowing that her strike-craft compliment would not be badly affected and that her casualties for them would be light.

Looking towards her clock she noticed that it was the ships night cycle. She got up and downloaded the information from the ORCA and left her quarters, entering the brightly lit corridors of the NOMAD noticing that there were still a few members of the crew moving around, she made her way to the mess hall while thinking about her plan to retake the colony. She knew that the fleet would come out on the edge of the system out of sensor range. The thing that bothered her was that she could no longer get in contact with the remaining forces in the system which meant they were either dead or blocked by ECM she personally hoped for the second option.

Entering the mess hall she found it mostly empty and headed to her secret stash of Reach TEA so that she could calm her nerves, while she waited for the water to boil she opened her Omni-tool and looked through the data, it showed that the colony had repulsed the first wave of invaders but the city was in ruins and General Williams setting up for more incoming forces. And nodded her head in approval she knew of General Williams reputation as an extremely reliable Commander who would always try to get as many of his people home.

Looking around she noticed an ensign sitting alone at one of the tables fidgeting looking pale and nervous in his navy uniform, she walked over towards him unnoticed. ''Can I sit here?'' she asks kindly.

The ensign jumps slightly his head swiveling around to her immediately. ''of ... course Ma'am.'' He stammers out trying to maintain eye contact failing miserably, as his fidgeting becomes slightly worse.

Taking a seat directly across from him while she looks at him intently thinking of what to discuss with him. '' The names Jennie yours?''

He looks startled for a moment. ''Oh sorry ma'am it's Ethan .'' He answers quickly as they fall into a quiet silence for a moment.

''What can I do for you Ma'am,'' he asks quietly while focusing everywhere but her.

Looking at him carefully her eyes looking at him carefully. ''Were off duty for the moment so call me by my name. And let me guess first deployment fresh out of the academy? '' she says as if it were a fact and asks kindly while looking at him with a smile and drinks her tea.

He just nods his head while he looks towards the tea his head tilting to the side slightly. ''Yes Ma ... Jennie and that doesn't smell like the usual military tea,'' he asks slightly more confident eyeing the tea.

She nods her head glad he doesn't know that she is an Admiral ''Yes Special stash that I have, you nervous about the coming Battle were only about a day out now.'' She says quietly her smile dropping slightly thinking of the possible losses that she will have to take.

He nods his head his eyes closing looking up slightly, she notices that his hands are shaking. ''It's all right to be afraid of what's coming, you just have to trust in those around you to do their job and do yours, it means that others can depend on you and that more people will make it out of this. Just don't be a hero but do your duty and more of us will make it out of this.'' She says sternly experience coating her words

He looks at her intently taking her words to heart but gives her a questioning look. ''You seen a lot of action Ma... Jennie?.'' He asks nervously correcting his slip up.

She nods her head her mood dropping thinking back to the insurrection and the loss of so many of her friends. ''Ya have seen way too much of it if you ask me, just our luck that we would be throwing into the fire so soon after the last war,'' she says dejectedly her voice tinged with regret.

Taken off guard slightly by the way her mood seemed to change, he started to get nervous again not sure what to do. ''sorry, I didn't mean to bring up something sensitive.'' he says quietly staring at the table looking guilty.

Startling Shepard out of her thought's while looking a little sheepish at letting her emotions control, rubbing her hand over her face and taking a deep breath. ''It's fine slightly my fault. I have to get to my duties thanks for the talk'' she says quickly while leaving the room as fast as possible.

''Good luck, Ethan'' she says quietly on her way out barely heard.

Taking a rail system towards the hangar bay trying to clear her thoughts of the past, while looking at the display in the system used to see space, she could the strange silvery blue glow of her ships FTL. The elevator came to a stop and allowed her to disembark, looking through the hanger she could see the deck crews working hard to prepare the ship's complement of strike-craft.

Looking over them she could only wish that she had these kinds of fighters during the Insurrection when she was a pilot, while her old star-fury fighter would always remain a great fighter in its own right, these new ones were just leagues ahead of what they had during the insurrection, then again she mused even those old things would give these council races strike-craft a run for there money. A small grin on her face.

Deciding that she couldn't do anything till they arrived in the system since it was already planned, she made a move towards the simulators. Moving towards them trying to think of what was to come if she made it through this next fight and what Scenario would test her skills.

 **Irene Shanxi Forest**

She was currently caked in dirt and foliage digging in a pitfall trap just ahead of the line, The hidden bunkers that were meant to hide her unit were low to the ground, just high enough for their guns to tear into anyone who tried to advance. She looked towards the camouflaged tanks that were meant to help hold the line, they only had eight of them spread out there guns poking out of there hiding spots.

Continuing her mission of fortifying the area bored with such a simple job. Her thoughts drifted towards the people she had just lost in space, how she would no longer get to banter with the Captain or the funny attempts of Jimmy trying to flirt with her only to be terrible at it. The last thing that plagues her is how was she going to tell Alex's family about what happened. Looking up to the stars and closing her optics clearing her thoughts and focusing, She dug with more determination pushing her systems to there max, she would make the bastards pay for what they had done, she would have her revenge she owed her friends that much.

 **Major Victus Aboard the Dreadnought HSF Guardian**

He was currently going over what the STG had managed to gather from this new races vessels. He was deeply impressed by what he had managed to see them do to the slaver fleet. He looked around his grey and blue armour shining in the ship's lighting, the crew of the ship was currently on its graveyard shift so there were few currently manning the terminals, getting up and working loose all of his mussels from his long sitting, hearing a satisfying pop in his joints he made his way to the observation deck.

Walking through the dimly lit corridor he reflected on his military career, many had called him an unorthodox leader whenever he leads his men, he mused that he often had men transferring out of his command because of how he did things but he always got the job done.

Entering the observation deck he noticed that it was completely empty, Taking a seat trying to make sense of why they had missed such a large group of ships. _''We should not have missed this our informants should have seen it coming, so why is it that STG couldn't notify us they have a vast network there was no chance they missed it.''_

Thinking back to all the previous engagements with the pirates he couldn't help but loathe the council for not acting, it was no secret among the navy that the terminus fleets were getting large. If not outdated and that the number of engagements that occurred, he had heard reports that there were around seventy skirmishes in the last month. That wasn't including the full blowing engagement between three fleets and a small armada, which of course was the current issue, which was causing the patrol fleets to be under-strength lacking a few of there dreadnoughts and escorts.

Looking out into space he could see the blue hue of the FTL drive, he could only watch as time slipped past him thinking of all the current issues plaque the Hierarchy and the battle that would happen in two days. He also mused at how one of this new races dreadnaught would stand against one of the Hierarchys.

 **Admiral Ka'hairal Kaprak**

He was currently standing in a brightly lit room surrounded by his command staff waiting for a priority message to be decrypted. It came from command so he had assembled his most capable men to discuss what it meant. He currently was just a relay jump away from his designated relay for Operation Ravenous, he along with two other armadas would hit a council seat race and take as many of there people for the Hegemony he was meant to hit the Salarians.

A sniveling communication officer came towards him with a data-pad his posture weak and unworthy. ''Admiral Command wants us to divert to relay 314 and group with Admiral Sotok, It says that there is a new race, that he encountered and we are to help gather as many of there kind as possible. ''He says in a nasal voice keeping minimal eye contact.

Kaprak nodded with what was said and went over the information in his head getting a distant look. ''I see, set a course for it what is our expected time of arrival.'' He orders.

''six days Admiral if we push the ships limits.'' Says the Navigation officer.

''I know that our fleets were all stationed near one another encase we ran into a patrol guess it paid off this time.'' He muses to himself

''Admiral we are only a relay jump away but it will take us a few hours to get the fleet to form up and get moving towards the relay 314, and our best estimates put our meet up only 2 hours difference with the other fleet.'' says the navigational officer confidently.

He turns around and moves to the center of the bridge where his chair was positioned higher than anywhere else in the bridge. ''Good that means that we will be able to conquer this new races planet within the week.'' Sitting down looking over the information that was sent only skimming it before putting it down.

His Xo approached him with his posture proud and arrogant. ''Admiral what are the plans for once we arrive at there system.'' he questions.

He looks at his Xo giving him a mild glare ''We don't need a plan to deal with primitives, we go there we invade and we take their people they are no threat to us, I doubt that they have anything that can be a threat to us, I doubt that they even have a navy that can compare to us and the Hegemony will crush them, also the Turian fleets are to spread out to be a threat for the time.'' He states Confidently.

Dismissing him as he gets up and moves to leave and enjoy the comforts of his quarters. ''Do your jobs you pieces crap and get us there ahead of time I want a good hall, I find any of you failing in your duty you will be showing the airlock.'' He barks out while leaving his head turned just so he can see behind him.

 **Admiral Orinia**

Going over the sensors that were currently linked to the Alliance ships in the system trying to figure out a plan of action. Currently, they were hiding in the gas planets atmosphere which was causing all kinds of issues on their sensors, the only ships not affected were the stealth ships that were relaying all of the information.

Looking up from her terminal and blinking the tiredness out of her eyes, she had barely slept since they had fled from the colonies orbit, she tried to come up with plans. All of which would see to the remainder of her fleet either destroyed or crippled, sighing she closed the terminal and made her way to get something to eat while dismissing any crew that saluted her.

As she walked to the mess hall she passed the med-bay and grimaced, it was nearly filled with wounded from all of the impacts her ship had taken, the burdens of the previous engagement easily seen if one were to look closely. Her posture was proud but her walk was slightly sluggish and her eyes showing pain and rage.

Bringing her Omni-toll up and looking at the countdown till the arrival of the human fleet. Less than a day out, She just wished that the Batarians hadn't wised up and began to jam all the reports coming from the planet and were looking for signals out of the system.

She made her way to possibly would be one of her last meals thinking of what was to come and maybe to take some sleep medication.

 **Codex**

 **Specialised Alliance infantry**

 **ODST:** Orbital drop shock troopers were first conceived in the year of 2137 by the United Nations and would later be adopted by all other nations. They would first see action against minor threats till the insurrection. Where they would be truly tested in the war.

The training for ODST is one of the toughest and harshest training regimes in the alliance requiring, at least a two years of training and conditioning to prepare them for the stress of the position. They are often recruited into the N program for there skill.

A Unique branch of the ODST is the JODST or Jump Troopers.

 **Jump Troopers:** Jump Troopers are specialized ODST focused on Re-con and hit and run tactics. They are often seen mixed in with ODST and used for rapid redeployment, there training is a step above Normal ODST and takes an extra 6 months to use effectively, they were introduced in the year of 2153 after a breakthrough in mass effect fields. This allowed them to use jump packs to maneuver in a combat zone.

 **N-special forces:** The N special forces branch was the joining of all nation special force organizations, only the best are selected from soldiers that show there abilities and skill. The N-special forces are all trained in both ODST and Jump Trooper Equipment. While also receiving even more specialized training in Hacking, Infiltration and weapons handling.

 **Drop Pods:** Drop pods used by the ODST are armored and lightly shielded allowing them to survive hits from AA and missiles. They crew a single ODST and are recoverable after the drop. They are equipped with an advanced sensor net and Communications system. To update forces on both the operations status as well as provide Intel to the Company and commanders. They have multiple safety and decent control systems allowing safe deployments.

 **ThunderHawk Gunship:** A hybrid ground attack gunship and transport capable of holding 30 marines and Two Panther UV, and is equipped with a Dorsal Mounted Mini Mac and two twin-linked grenade launchers and two rapid-fire rail-guns and two Missile pods, making it and well-rounded attack craft while been a capable transport.

They are used in both planetary invasions and Boarding actions in space and were introduced in the year 2218.


	7. Chapter 7-Dawn of the storm

**Admiral Orinia on board the TALON**

She was currently in the sparing ring with Sabelus one of the few infantrymen aboard her ship engaging in CQC, they had already gone multiple rounds trying to beat each other. ''This is getting annoying having to wait for reinforcements, while our people are stuck on that colony.'' Growled out Sabelus, as he sent a jab at the Admiral only for it to be blocked and countered with a swift kick to his leg.

''They will be here soon enough and we can pay them back in full,'' states Orinia only to narrowly avoid a leg strike.

Blocking her counter strike only to be hit by a quick jab to the chest Sabelus loses his balance and is quickly knocked on his arse. ''Damn! Guess you win the round.'' He wheezes out.

''Good Spar, get yourself cleaned up and fed.'' She commends as she begins to move out of the ring.

Making her way towards the ship's showers while undoing her armor.

 **''Admiral sensors have picked up hundreds of transports coming through the relay, you are needed on the bridge.''** Says one of her men over the PA system his voice neutral.

Her shoulders slumping slightly trying to suppress the groan that escaped her mandibles, Composing herself and making her way towards the bridge, bringing up her Omni-tool and keying the bridge. ''Do we have any word from Captain Siliana on what their planing?.'' She Asks calmly.

''No Admiral, they are going through the information at the moment.'' Answers the officer.

''Good, I will take a shuttle to her ship so that we can plan, no need to waste time.'' She states Conviction in her voice.

Making her way towards the Talon's hanger bay while information was sent over to her Omni-tool. It showed a massive number of transports with a small escort and a single dreadnaught protecting the transports, trying to make a plan that could deal with them, she failed to notice a human shuttle landing in the bay.

A tap to her shoulder brought her attention over her shoulder, noticing that it was just her marine escort she relaxed, going over the details of the information waiting for the shuttle to open its ramp.

''That Shuttle is a beauty don't you think Ma'am'' Asks Sabelus sounding awed looking over the Thunderhawk.

''I guess, I think that it would definitely get people on the ground and support them but, It's just look at that thing it's so much larger than one of our shuttles and it is more like one of our gunships.'' Says Orinia little emotion in her voice.

Sabelus grunts his agreement while he examines the large gunship. While one of three bays open up at the nose of the transport, three figures exiting one been the captain and her two guards all in alliance armor.

''Captain, I was just going through the information, I would suggest we head for the CIC center of the ship to discuss a plan of action.'' Says Admiral Orinia as more of an order than a suggestion.

''All right, Admiral this is your boat so lead the way.'' Responds the captain while making a human gesture with her hand.

Turning and heading towards the CIC Orinia noted that the captain moved to her side.

Siliana turned her head towards the admiral. ''I have a plan that I would like to go over when we arrive but, it carries a lot of risks I want your input.'' She says sounding slightly distracted.

''I understand but we can't risk giving away our ships, a in system jump would allow them to track us here,'' Orinia states while stepping into an elevator.

''Yes but I was thinking of using what remained of our stealth vessels to go through with this, We currently have one over Shanxi with another thirteen within the fleet of ten are destroyer class,'' Siliana states while she steps over to the projector bringing up the system.

Tapping her fingers across the display she zoomed into where the transports were and there projected path. ''Currently, we have over 800 transports that just came through the relay and this is the path they are taking.'' Siliana states as the projection begin to scroll over to a new image a strange ball with long protrusions.

''These were laid by the fleet in the retreat from the relay, they are marked IV Nuclear space mines capable of producing 80 gigatons of force.'' Looking at the shocked faces as Siliana zooms out showing there projected path intersects.

''I want to use them to take out a large portion of the invasion force, I also want to use our stealth ships to hit them after detonation to give the colony more time.'' She says while looking uncomfortable.

Orinia getting over the shock of the yield of the nuke looks at her. ''I can see that it's a good plan so why do you seem so worried about it, your ships should be able to get out of the Ao before they can be intercepted.'' She states

''They can but it's the next part of the operation that bothers me,'' Siliana says as she brings up an image of the fleet over Shanxi. She points towards a single Dreadnaught. ''This is where the Batarian Admiral is. I want to have a few of the remaining jump troopers we have jump and board it, and have him killed while taking more data from the ship.'' She finished not sounding too happy about the idea.

Orinia goes over the information thinking of different plans while looking at the projector. ''I think it is a good plan, but how do you plan to get your people off that ship,'' she says still going over a plan. ''The other thing is what do you want my people to do?.'' she says sounding curious.

When the captain looked at her startled from been asked a question her face showing slight worry. ''I was thinking on maybe having our fleet engage them with the stealth ships but there's to much risk.'' She says dejectedly while examing the readings.

 **Admiral Porvan**

He stood on the bridge of the ship looking out one of the windows while going over his fleets information. He noted that the fleet was mostly grouped together, over the planet with a token force near the relay. He grinned as he noticed that the full invasion fleet had arrived with its escorts. He made his way towards his chair so that he could watch the invasion begin upon their arrival.

He watched as a representation of the system came to life waiting for the fun to begin, he watched as his crew began to send out his orders and do what was needed.

A massive flare on his projector caught his attention as he looked sharply to it, noticing that it had originated in the transports fleets location, only for thirteen ships to appear on sensors.

''MOVE TO INTERCEPT THAT FLEET!'' Porvan Bellows while his hands try to crush his armrests.

''What is the status of the escorts and how long do we have till we arrive?'' He orders while looking at the display focusing on it.

His pilot is the first to respond in a tight voice. ''We will be in firing range in eight minutes Admiral.'' He answers as fast as possible while getting the ship moving.

The ship shakes for a moment a few seconds before the fleet is underway, only for his ship's engines to blow out in a quick explosion, knocking the crew off balance for a moment, porvan got up and looked around growling as he watched his fleet pull away. ''STATUS REPORT!'' He barks out.

''We don't know Admiral, engineering reports that the engines exploded for an... WE HAVE BOARDERS!.'' says a communications officer only to shout at the end his voice showing signs of worry.

Porvan grabs his helmet and slides it on and taking his pistol out. ''Prepare your weapons what is the status of our forces,'' Porvan Growls out while cycling his projector to the borders.

 **Sergeant Jack Miller Orca airlock** (15 minutes earlier)

He stood in his fully sealed jumpsuit at the head of an eight-man squad. Looking out to the enemy fleet, his gaze on the dreadnaught believed to hold the hostile VIP.

''Nothing like a good old fashion spacewalk, right Miller?'' joked Madison her voice carrying an edge of nervousness, Her visor fully polarized and her black and white armor clean and unmarked.

Turning his head to look at her and nodding. ''Ya though I have to agree there, I just wish that there was more stuff to look at, it just seems so bland, like Vega.'' He responds good-naturedly, an OI on the back round channel at his comment.

Quickly going over to Madison and checking all of her seals and clapping her on the shoulder, giving her the all clear. Looking down over the large number of C12 they were carrying.

''You think the boys at Shanxi will like the fireworks we going to gift them?'' Vega asks his voice chipper.

''Maybe, but I think we may be going for a bit of overkill.'' Says Madison sounding thoughtful while bringing one her hands to her chin.

A sound over the Comm's grabs there attention. ''Okay people were opening up the airlock in a moment, Good luck out there.

The squad goes over the final checks and gets ready, the airlock sucks all the air out of itself as the lock begins to open. The eight-man squad jumps out making use of miniature corrections to stay on course. Miller looks around and sees that the breaching team of 16 men on his HUD further away. Focusing back on there objective the engines on the back of the ship.

Looking at the view of the planet he can't help but admire how it looks from space, a few minutes of silence as they slowly drift towards the ship, it's size slowly increasing.

Slowly decreasing his velocity as his squad does the same, as they near the ship they pass the kinetic barriers, turning so there feet are angled to meet the ship and activate their mag boots. Looking around he sees that his squad are all in position, signaling to move towards the engines while pulling out charges.

The squad of 8 moves around the ships large engines, placing their explosives all around them using up most of there stock, they are signaled and begin to move to a nearby airlock.

Miller looks to his hud which indicates he had three minutes until the attack on the convoy occurs. Moving towards the airlock that their squad is meant to breach by. Looking around he sees that his squad is converging on the objective. Upon arriving at the airlock he pulls out some of his C12 and places it to the door, moving back and taking cover away from the airlock.

He looks to his HUD which shows there is a minute left, bracing himself for the explosion to come. His Breathing is calm and controlled his training keeping him calm. The clock slowly ticks down as it hits Zero, he sees small bright marble sized explosions in the distance. As the ships begin to move the second timer hits zero and their explosives go off. Shaking him a bit, Vega reacts quickly darting into the airlock placing more charges, he comes out a moment later and takes cover and then sets off the explosives. Air rushes out the breach three of the aliens flying out into the cold void.

''GO! GO! GO!'' He barks out as they charge into the ship taking cover as they enter, the hall is lit the lights near there door flickering. ''Vega take your fireteam and push through there.'' as he points to the left corridor. ''The rest of you on me were going the other way, remember people we're here to neutralize their admiral, once that's done see if you can grab intel if not haul ass and deploy planetside.''

They advanced down the corridor at a good pace, upon arriving at the door Miller pulls out his Omni-tool and began to hack the door. ''Madison check in with the other squad and find out there status.'' He orders only getting a nod from her.

Madison nods her head her gun still pointed at the door as she gets her updates. ''Team one is making good headway towards the engines room, Team two seems to have run into resistance and is pushing slowly... Vega says Omni gel works on the locks sir.'' She replies all business

''Save the Omni-gel for this lock I'm almost through we can use it to advance after this point, there got the door,'' Miller says as he brings his gun to the ready.

The doors open and Jackson and Anna prepare a grenade for breaching as air rushes out the doors, they are met with gunfire from two squads of soldiers, as Miller's barriers flare he gets into cover as his squad throw grenades into the corridor, they wait a second and pull out of cover and charge into the room firing taking down the defenders, they dive for cover to avoid a barrage from a turret, Maddison shoots off a grenade from her gun at the turret hoping to take down its gunner, the explosion leaves it a mangled piece of metal while the defenders are all left bleed out.

''Squad Status.'' Barks miller while searching for more hostiles.

A round of all clears and I'm clean are heard, the squad advances to the next door slowly checking the corners for possible traps. They arrive only for the door to open followed by a torrent of bullets hammering their barriers barely making it cover.

Jackson hugs a wall adjacent a small amount of blood running down his chest. ''I'm hit not gonna be able to use my rifle with this,'' he calls out

Quickly deploying a drone to get a look he notices a torrent of guards in the next corridor. ''This is gonna be a problem,'' Miller grunts out.

 **Admiral Porvan**

He stood aboard his ship looking over the security feeds of multiple boarding parties. ''Where did they come from!'' He growls out while sealing his suit and putting on his helmet.

A nervous officer manning the scanning arrays is frantically going through, the ships readings while looking over his shoulder. ''We don't have anything on sensors admiral, they came out of nowhere.

Porvan tightens his grip on his guns, looking over to his communication officer his face marred by a frown. ''What is the status of the borders and the transports?'' he says quietly.

The communication officer gulps. ''Sir the borders are making good progress our men didn't have their weapons, and they managed to cut us off from the main armory, our only armed guards are at engineering and they have been lost, and the security teams are reporting there almost here,'' he says dejectedly while looking at his pistol.

Porvan blinks. ''What, they can't be here their primitives!.'' His demeanor slouching slightly then a glint enters his eyes and turns to his terminal.

 **Jack Miller**

Walking to the last door with a limp he signals for a breaching charge and aims his pistol. ''Okay this is the last door to engineering once it's broke were getting out of here.'' He says fatigue coating his words.

Jackson places a charge and pulls back, an explosion followed by the door bending inwards leaving just enough room to get through, they charge in only to be met with a large group of suited aliens all of which have subdued the Batarians.

Blinking slightly he slowly lowers his rifle at the unknowns. ''Anyone got a Translation program?'' He asks the squad in a small voice.

''No Sir we didn't think that it would be'' Maddison is cut off by an alarm and the drive core starting to get brighter, The suited aliens make a run for the door.

''That can't be good.'' States Jackson as he starts to follow the group of aliens.

Miller turns on his long-range communications. ''All Breaching teams I think the ships gonna blow get to the...'' He never finishes his warning as a fiery explosion destroys the ship.

 **Captain Siliana**

She was looking over the status of the ambush and was sorely disappointed with the results, A deep frown on her face they had only destroyed near 300 transports, the problem is that was only a quarter of them and that she now had eight damaged stealth ships, She put down the datapad and turned to get something to reduce the stress of the situation, As she made to leave now that the fleet was safe a priority alert came from the ORCA.

Establishing a live visual feed with the captain of the ship, which was strange because that broke all kinds of stealth regulations. AS the captains face appeared it currently had a large gash across his cheek and his bridge in ordered chaos.

''Captian were going down there flagship just detonated itself, we took a bad hit and our engines are down, We will try to make for the city we sent word to the general, wish us luck.'' and the transmission cuts off.

Taking a seat while taking deep breaths she could barely believe what she heard, her head dropping into her hands and could only loath her plan that had cost her peoples lives.


	8. Chapter 8-The Eye of the storm

**Answers to the reviews**

 **Blaze1992:** Nope not gonna be impossible to help the Quarians just gonna cause a bit of political strife down the line so no worries there.

 **Heartfanglives:** It was not Vega that died though it was a relative which will affect his character when I get around to writing him.

The Turians are pretty much acting as an advisor for the time been and you will find out soon about what their role is going to be in the fight

 **Disclaimer since I ain't done it in a while: I don't own mass effect or anything in this story except a few characters of my own creation and it's plot.**

 **General Williams**

He watched as the Orca fell from orbit on his tactical table, closing his eyes and saying a silent prayer for the crew of the ship, opening his eyes he focuses on their projected landing site.

''Get me a task force ready I needed it yesterday people! we need to rescue any survivors, and signal our men it's time for round two it seems.'' He barks out while taking a seat as he zooms out and looks at the map of his defences.

The area around the city with main routes were all barricaded and dug in with trenches, while the surrounding forest was entrenched with hidden bunkers and minefields, all of which were crewed by AI.

He grimaced at that, it was never wise to keep a company of AI from the fight, they hated waiting and were a hell of a lot worse when it came to protecting their creators. As it stands Irene had given him a long hard glare during the debrief. Looking around he saw that the Turian general had arrived and was busy going over a report while he stood in his armour.

Getting an alert that a team was dispatched to try and recover the crew of the Orca drew his attention, letting out a sigh he got up and made his way over to the Turian general.

''What do you think they will try this time?'' He asks Desolas while looking at the report he was reading which was an overview of the battle and his troops.

Humming thoughtfully for a moment before looking at him. ''If they follow standard procedure it would be to land across the entire city though, with what happened last time they will try and land in the outskirts of our perimeter and try to push in from all sides, I also think that they will still attempt to land in the city but not in force unless they're stupid.'' He says confidently while going back over to the report.

Nodding whilst glancing at the tactical table. ''I guess we will just have to wait and see, at least we managed to set up the outer perimeter, you said that it would put a full halt in their push why?'' He questions doubting that it will be as effective has the Turian thought, it was after all easy to counter if you knew the correct tactics.

Desolas looks back at him and nodding his confidence not shaking at all. ''Yes, I have yet to see such a tactic we have similar but none so well thought out, my people tend to take a straightforward approach and use our numbers and superior fire-power, even when we're on the defensive we hardly use such methods as hiding we mainly keep our bunkers easier seen, I think if I were to compare your strategy to all of the current ones yours resemble that of the Asari commandos mixed with Turian trench tactics. While it is not unheard of it is almost never used like this it will work.'' He says while still going over the report.

''I guess we will have to see then.'' looking back to the tactical table he saw that the transports were about to enter the atmosphere and were heading for predicted landing sites. Letting out a sigh, he made his way while saying a quick prayer for the safety and protection of his people.

 **Jack Harper**

He was currently in one of the Panthers covered in foil edge around a predicted landing site, Jack Harper currently stood behind one of eight others surrounding the site waiting, his eyes were focused and searching the skies for any hostile s.

He turns his head slightly to look over his shoulder at Eva Core, who was currently wearing the standard military armour with her helmet at her side, black hair in a small ponytail her eyes focused on a scanner. ''You got anything on sensors or the channel.'' He asks eagerly.

Quickly going over the channels and sensors, as a small smile begins to form. ''Yes sir, We got at least three transports inbound to our location,'' she says excitement lacing her voice

''Good, LOCK AND LOAD PEOPLE!'' He says over the channel while pulling back the bolt to arm his gun, He looks to the sky and sees the dropships in the distance.

''Hold until their in the kill box you are to fire on my command,'' he orders as they slowly begin to descend.

As the transports begin to land harper waits till there only 80 meters from the ground before he takes a deep breath. ''FIRE AT WILL!'' He barks over the channel as he opens fire with his gun.

Rounds from both panthers and rocket launchers around the site opened fire on the landing craft destroying one, while the remaining two spirals out of control trying to avoid the ambush.

The transports doors opened up and hostile troops charged to jump for the ground returning fire which caused the Panthers barriers flare. Concentrating fire on the hoard of troops that kept on coming, his eyes catching more transports on the horizon.

"Fall back we got more incoming, Eva get command on the horn for our orders" Harper barks out while turning his gun on to the inbound transports to delay them.

"I'm trying but the channels to filled with chatter." A hint of panic laces her voice as she keeps working on the comm's

 **Commander Vorak**

He was currently aboard one of the many kinds of transport landing on the planet, he was headed for the main staging area, his well-decorated Armour making him stand out to show his status, it was a deep blue and black Armour which showed signs of combat.

Disembarking and making his way towards the front of his company, Harbinger company they were the elites of this campaign and he was to lead them and break the stiff defence on the eastern trenches of the city.

"listen up Harbingers, these new slaves that belong to the Hegemony, they have managed to hold back our pathetic Comrades!" He sneered while his eyes roamed his fellow soldiers.

"They have failed to break them, we will not for we are there betters and we will crush them beneath our boots. Move out!" He barks out with a maniacal grin on his face as his company began their approach to the battlefield his armour shining in the sun.

 **Irene Shanxi Trenches**

She looked down at the charging forces letting loose another barrage from her mortar and minigun, obliterating the charging troops. The fields around her were blackened and desolate earth throwing around, it was eerily similar to the world war one war zones, the sound of artillery and gunfire filled her sensors, the field in front of her were littered with dead and disfigured bodies and in some areas high enough to provide cover for the advancing forces she noted.

Looking at the advancing forces she notices they were better armed, quickly switching over to her HMG for better accuracy the same forest camouflaged as her chassis as she aimed it at the advancing forces, letting loose a barrage that cut some of them down, she noticed that her rounds tore them to shreds leaving their bodies a pile of mince. They Return fire and force her to drop to cover again sending of a mortar round in their general direction.

 _'' N..E YO. ..VE A M...IVE WAV. .N. RE...METNS ARE .. R... .o. ..e t. ..llba..., ..ck .o .he .d l..e''_ Came a garbled broadcast over the channel.

Irene reloaded her mortar clip and looked to one of her men. ''Get that signal cleared up we need to know what's inbound.'' She says agitated unloading a full clip into an advancing squad forcing them to cover.

''INCOMING TANKS!'' shouts someone panic clearly heard.

Quickly dropping into cover and exchanging her mortar for her missile launcher while firing blindly into the advancing hostiles, the audible click of her weapon fitting into it slot lets her know her weapon is ready, standing back up she sees a large column is advancing on their position.

''Permission to detonate the minefield, Ma'am?'' Asks a scared private, which was obviously a young AI fresh out of boot since his chassis was still unmarked.

She nodded her head while trying to halt the advancing tide, a mass of dirt was kicked up followed by a massive shockwave knocking her off her feet. ''What the hell was that, mines don't have enough explosives for that kind of shock wave.'' she said exacerbated at the situation as she was knocked back again.

Steadying herself she looked at the advancing wave, and saw that the minefield had been blown by accident from an orbital barrage. ''BLOODY HELL THATS FROM ORBIT, PULL BACK DAMMIT GET TO THE SECOND LINE.'' She barks out while trying to get some control of her platoon, they were currently disarrayed with hostiles so close to the trenches and the constant jamming causing issues.

Looking back at the advancing forces she saw that they seemed endless. There was another force that came now that seemed more determined than the last, she let out a quick burst from her gun while pulling back to the second line.

 **Saren Arterius**

Diving behind cover as another barrage of weapons fire tried to gun him down, he slid into cover and blindly fired his armour covered in both blood and earth, his team quickly dealt with the hostile ambush and began to move to the rally point.

''Spirits, how many of those transports are they sending to get them through this amount of flak.'' Complains Lucia her voice strained as she looks to the sky, while others glanced at it too.

The sky above the city was covered with a large number of missiles and shuttles kept dancing among one another, higher in the atmosphere frigates could be seen some were falling to the planet smoking while others were pulling back and firing onto the trenches.

''I wonder how long the line will hold against that kind of barrage,'' Saren says warily while watching as another shuttle crash lands not far from their location.

''I hope that fleet of theirs arriving here soon I don't like the odds right now.'' Says Chellic while surveying the new crash site.

A sharp crack and a flaring of the barriers forces his squad to cover, the firefight is quick and decisive to finish off a few wounded Batarians, the squad continues to clean up any survivors and move onto the other objectives of the mission.

 **Jack Harper**

Firing into a landing zone that they had managed to get deep behind enemy lines, Currently, his armour was caked in dirt, his helmet had a groove from when he nearly lost his head and held a small crack in his visor.

''DAMMIT!'' Shouts Eva as another rocket nearly hit's the vehicle swerving causing him to lose his balance, his aim going wide missing a few of the Krogan that were landing.

''Pull back, there's too many of them we'll find another site to hit.'' Barks harper agitatedly as he adjusts his aim, the company of six Panthers pulls out.

''Major, I got something on sensors, it's one of ours, sir,'' Eva says tiredly while pulling her helmet off.

The sun was setting in the distance as more shuttles continued to land on the outskirts of the city, looking around the forest he could see the city aflame from his point of view on the mountain.

''What have you got for us, also what the ammo looks like at the moment been awhile since resupplied?'' he asks while blinking to try and concentrate.

''We took more than we needed earlier so we could probably go for another four hours or so at the rate were engaging them, also that the signal is from the group that got pinned down trying to evacuate the Orca Survivors,'' Eva says.

He nods while looking around the empty forest. ''Good we can regroup with them for now and try to make it to the city,'' Harper says absent-mindedly while searching.

 **Anderson**

He peeked from behind the wreckage of one of the Panthers firing into the ambushers, looking around he sees that they are thinning out, a tank shell lands obliterating some of their cover its coax keeping them suppressed.

''Are we getting through to command or any nearby forces?'' He asks his voice steady and calm.

''No Sir, it seems we're stuck between a rock and a hard place, anyone got ideas on how to get rid of that bloody tank?'' Replies Vanessa her voice calm and annoyed with their situation

 _'Well_ _we could do it the Russian way and charge and hopefully blow it u_ _p.'_ He thought morbidly.

''No, I have a few of them all of which are bad ideas most of which revolve around a grenade through the hatch or barrel which means charging.'' He says sounding rather ill with that plan.

Another shot from the tanks hits the panther he is using as cover causing it to flip over his head leaving him open. ''Shit!'' He shouts throwing a smoke grenade and diving to the right, his kinetic barriers fail and takes three rounds to his shoulder and arm, his suit immediately applies his medi-gel from his reserves.

''Dammit this is getting old fast okay fuck it! Volley smoke rounds let's charge him because we're sitting ducks here.'' He says over the channel his voice strained as he charges the tank throwing another smoke grenade.

The squad of N7 break from the remaining forces holding back the few remaining hostiles, there push is constantly under fire in which they are quick to return moving in and out of cover, timing their smoke grenades to keep the tank's sight impaired as much as possible as they push from four different directions, the gunners in the tank fire blindly trying to keep them suppressed, the rounds aimed to low and hitting just in front of them or not enough to drain their barriers, the sounds of an alarm in the distance alerts them to the tank's gun overheating.

Bursting through the last of the smoke the tank is seen clearly only a few meters in front of him, it's gun rotates and locks onto him, diving quickly to the side landing on his injured arm, gritting his teeth he doesn't see Vanessa throw a grenade down the barrel while Urban begins climbing to the hatch. The grenade goes off causing the barrel to morph slightly larger as well as causing a secondary explosion, urban waits a moment then open the hatch spraying into the crew clearing it out.

''Never doing that again almost lost my head'' says Urban a smile on his face his helmet long discarded revealing, an Asian face and brunette hair his brown eyes searching the surroundings.

''I agree with that because again not wanting to face your wife's stare mate, still don't see what she likes about your ugly mug mate,'' Percy replies jovially while taking his helmet off to reveal his black hair and green eyes a scar going over his one eye, he examines his helmet quickly and discards it. ''Helmets busted now, this is your fault Urban your lucks rubbing off on us.'' He exclaims.

Anderson replies first as he leads them back to their group a smile on his face. ''Can it Jackson, I just might sic Hanna on you if you don't play nice, Though he is right, Urban your bad lucks starting to rub off on us.'' He says

Jackson is about to reply when they hear the sound of vehicles approaching.

''Spread out'' Anderson says moving behind a rock for cover, the sound of vehicles coming closer fills the air, the gun in his hands feels heavy his breath deep and eyes focused, he prepares to attack, the sound is close only a few more meters he licks his lips. ''Now!''

Rising from his cover and shouldering his gun, only to come to face down an advancing panther and it's occupants.

''I heard there was some action over the channel, but it seems you guys already took care of it'' says the man on top of the gun.

 **Nyxarir Sedeios**

Her yellow Eclipse armour was covered in earth and blue blood of her fallen sisters, as the surrounding area was bombarded by artillery one of her fellow eclipse raised a barrier to provide cover for a few others, Her head jerks back blood and bone splattering onto the wall behind her.

''This is a Goddess damned killing field that they sent us into, I didn't sign up for this.'' Shouts another eclipse as she sends a warp field down the street and turns around to run only to have an explosion rip her apart, the explosion knocks Nyxarir down her armour suffering cosmetic damage while killing a few of her comrades.

Some of her fellow sisters cluster together with their legs close to their chests whimpering, others around her try to charge and take down one of the heavy weapons or one of the surrounding hostile soldiers only to be cut down.

She crouches down folding her weapon and joining the triage center in the building connected to her trench, she sees tables and stretches filled with Asari the majority of them covered in bandages, some that she passes by are missing a leg or an arm some of them missing more than just a limb, the worst of her fellow eclipse are those that have lost close to half their bodies with little hope of survival, looking around she sees that there are fewer wounded than dead.

She moves towards a stack of crates and takes a seat, and begins to weep knowing that the majority of her fellow sisters are no more than over 200 years old and that her life is most likely over.

 **Shanxi System**

The Batarian fleet of six hundred warships hung over the planet with their transports, they continued to launch countless waves of transports to the surface, a few of their scant patrols trying to find the remaining vessels and provide information.

The remnants of the defence fleets were scattered giving tactical information on the system, the carriers working overtime to fix up their strike-craft and damage to the stealth ships, their commanders going over possible solutions and strategize, the few working stealth vessels were currently spread around the system shadowing the positions of the Batarian fleet providing crucial Intel.

The fighting on Shanxi is intense firefights breaking throughout the entire city as battle lines change every minute, buildings soaked and filled with bodies and blood as artillery on both sides continue to deliver their ordnance, Thunder-hawks and Batarian strike-craft engage one another and bombard the planet on any hostile s, Human military pour into the street engaging the flood of Batarians and mercenaries.

As the sun begins to set of Shanxi the Batarian forces begin to dig in to hold what they have gained, the humans and Turians Dig in and prepare for a long night, all the while The Exploration fleet drop out on the edge of the system ready for combat.

 **Going Through rewrite at the moment will post in the new Year**


	9. Rewrite is up

**The Rewrite is up**

 **It is called The Terminus Conflict**

 **And sorry for the Delay**


End file.
